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It's about five in the morning. The early morning sun shines onto the gravel of the parking lot, casting long shadows.

My brother and I sitting in a car. I'm in the driver's seat, but the car is parked, and the two of us are just looking at the houses on the street over.

There's some kind of argument, and idly, I imagine a spark near one of the houses.

Suddenly, there's smoke billowing from the windows of the house closest to the spark. Good job, me, bringing innocent bystanders into our argument.

I jump out of the car, shouting "Come on!"

My brother follows me to the house. I ring the doorbell twice -- come on, come on -- and a sleepy-looking woman answers the door.

I point out the billowing smoke, and she thanks me for my concern but tells me that's it's normal.

***

Later, I'm with my mom and brother visiting someone.

"We should get back home," I tell my mom, looking at the approaching storm.

The thunderstorm approaches at the speed of a semi truck, the first pellets of heavy rain hitting the ground in a continuous wave.

"Too late," says my mom, and we duck to the floor of the room (which is on the top of the house) and I'm holding up a floor mat to try to shield us both from the mud splattering into the room.

From what I've tasted of desire, I hold with those who favour fire...

Infiltrating a sorority/fraternity and it's terrible. And my female SHIELD agent is covering for the fact that Captain America is terrible at undercover work.

Now I'm part of a group of three people who are living semi-harmoniously in an older part of town. We have some interesting projects on the go, like improving playgrounds and adding giant transparent red walls to sidewalks so that people have to zigzag through.

I'm looking through a catalogue that has sheaths for ritual daggers that are being advertised pinned to the pages. There are daggers for earth, air, fire and water, and unsurprisingly I'm interested in the fire one.

And then I remember that I already have a ritual dagger. I turn it over in my hand. The blade is pure silver in the dream, unlike the real one.

I'm walking down a road, trying to find my way back to the original path.I know that if it takes too long to get back, I'll lose the thread of the dream, so I hold out a hand to the end of the street and soar towards it.

The street I want to take is the second from the end, but I can't find it, because the second path is now an alley that goes into someone's backyard. I follow the path and find a raspberry bush, and I look around for a basket. I decide that there will be one on the deck when I go to find it, but there's only a box that holds some kindling. I empty out the kindling onto the pile of smaller pieces of wood.

I look around and see an old, dying tree, and all I can notice is that the branches are so dead that they'd make great kindling for the cabin owner's fire.

There are workmen in the backyard. Apparently there are signs saying that they'd be in the area.

I'm Dean Winchester now. Sam and I know that when you get caught somewhere, you pretend that you belong there, so we approach the workmen and strike up a conversation.

They're vampires, as it turns out.

There's a fight.

I drive a stake into one man's chest—

wait, that's zombies in this universe

—and my silver dagger appears in my hand. I swing it around and slice into the vampire's neck as I throw my weight forward. The vampire stumbles, still off-balance from the stake, and I'm behind him, slicing into his throat and grabbing at his hair so that I can fully behead him.

(There's an argument as to whether this works according to the rules of the game. I win.)

There are bodies all over the back yard, now. We're going to have to burn them.

I grab wood from the shed out back and set to covering our dead vamps with lumber and kindling. I'm lighting the shed itself on fire when I hear a shout.

The man who appears was a friend of John Winchester's, and he's angry that his property is going up in flames.

I'm trying to choke him out without killing him. He struggles, and it's not working, but then he changes tactics and tries to grab at my ears and pull.

I decide that it's a trope of the genre that you can hit someone over the head and knock them out without being at risk of killing them, so one of us hits him over the head with the butt of a rifle.

Fire burns, and the old tree from earlier provides us with as much kindling as we need. I go over to the cabin, and realize that there's meat drying in the racks along the outside wall. My stomach churns as I realize that it's cursed all to hell—I don't want to think about what kind of meat has gone into the ground meat patties that are sitting on the rack, but there's a telltale haze of angry spirits hanging around the meat. Somehow, at least one of them is an ancient, powerful indigenous spirit, how the fucking hell...

I set it all on fire.

A blonde, average-sized woman with curly hair enters the yard, looking curious. "What's going on?" she asks, looking genuinely curious.

Because all we need is another civilian to knock out and haul away before they die of smoke inhalation.

"Ma'am," I start—

She looks past me. "You know, certain spirits are actually freed when you burn them."

Witch, I think. Of the Supernatural-style variety. I run forward, brandishing my knife, and she laughs as I plunge it into her chest. Light explodes from the place where the knife stabbed into her, and she soars up into the sky, a being of pure white light and destruction.

I turn around to deal with the spirit, and I think I'm calling up an explosion of—hellfire, soulfire?—and it's enveloped completely.

My long black cloak trails out behind me as I crash into the other witch, tearing into her. I snarl as I grab part of her cloak—pull it away with part of her essence as a ripping, tearing noise fills the air—and shoot past her. There are three of us, beings of darkness and the night, tearing through the sky and tearing into the thing of light that wants only to destroy.

Darkness can be a force for good in the world just as light can, and both can snuff out life as well as they can extend it. All we need—I think, flying at the other witch—is for some idiot to think that the good guy is being outnumbered here just because they're burning with Light.

One of us will win the contest and escape, and the rest of us will be doused with gasoline and burned to death.

Oh, it hurts. It hurts a lot.

Dream I:

There's very little that I can remember from this dream, but Dakota and I were at another house. I believe that we lived there together. Anyway, there was a fire up above--it's very difficult to explain, but we could see the fire because it was like the first level of the house had a porch and so did the second, and you could see the second porch from down on the first. There was even a ladder to get to it. As I was saying, there was a fire up top, and when he and I noticed we began working to extinguish it. It was very isolated, though, and although we knew it could spread it wasn't at the time. I believe we did end up getting rid of it.

Dream II:

Either I was playing a video game or the dream was like a video game, because the objective was to save the king by defeating these levels.

Throughout the dream I was somewhat conscious of my tulpa, Augustus, and I think I was wishing that I knew someone else who had a tulpa of their own. That being said, I couldn't afford much attention to Augustus because I was a knight for His Majesty, and it was imperative that I be the person to reach and save him before the others.

Most of the levels were very easy, because although the enemies were shooting at me I was protected in some sort of vehicle, and therefore I was able to kill them off before they were able to do the same to me. On the last level, however, I was without any form of protection, and so they shot me several times. I died, but I kept trying again (which is why I think of this as a sort of video game) until I finally shot and killed all of them.

Then, finally, I was near the king. He was at a Chunin Exams sort of place, and all of us (the knights) jumped out and tried to reach him first. I know that the rest of them were Naruto characters, but the only one I definitely remember was Tenten, who was dressed in more of a masculine style from the Renaissance era.

She got to him first and somehow stopped the oncoming attack--I don't remember how. I remember that the king--who was a bit pale, with sort of longish hair that came to his shoulder blades--looked bewildered, totally confused. I remember feeling a bit of fear, because I wasn't the one who got to him first (what would he do with me?). But the king was just fine and amiable, and he did not hate anyone for not getting to save him. I suppose he was too grateful for Tenten to be hateful!

After that, Tenten and I hung out a bit. I knew that she said she had a tulpa, but I wasn't sure if I believed her. I remember her cooking for me, though; I think she was trying to show me how to make something. Fire rose from the pan, and I had the distinct impression that her tulpa was right behind her, and I believed her.

#465 - 4:12AM - DILD

I have a long dream segment where I am at some version of my first job ever; Long John Silver's. I am revisiting as my current self and watching the manager cook. I join in and fry some fish.

Now I am riding in a car. I see a Sonic restaurant that is totally black with huge billows of smoke coming from it. I watch as we get closer and I can hear some theatrical and dangerous-sounding-music. Suddenly, the scene dims for just a fraction of a second. Then, I hear a short fart (lol) and some happy sounding music as I find myself riding in the same car, but in a very normal looking neighborhood. I notice the Sonic building is completely gone, and because of this, I instantly become lucid. I look at the driver and see my wife. I tell her how weird that glitch was and how this is all a dream. She keeps her eyes on the road with both hands on the wheel and only smiles in reply.
I continue, " So we can fly. Go. Fly us away."
The car lifts up into the air, but I lose visuals at this point and find myself floating in a bardo. I recognize this for what it is and try to stimulate some feeling by making swimming motions. After a few seconds, I begin to feel like the air is thickening into water. I see something... some movement. An animated electric blue outline of a shark emerges from the darkness and opens its jaws. It all looks very psychedelic so there is no fear. Instead of moving away, I pretend to be the bigger fish and open wide ready to bite. I wake up before we collide.

I got up at 3:15 and tried for a WILD. I laid there and laid there and felt the time pass and pass...until I finally saw the sky outside my window brighten. I was pretty discouraged. But this was the first morning in a long time where I was going to be able to sleep in. I finally decided that if I kept trying for a WILD, I would just stay awake. So I decided to just get into the most comfortable position and just try to sleep and hope for a DILD. I often have that happen when I can't WILD.

As I was drifting off, I heard my dog barking. It was making me angry, because I really needed to go to sleep and not be bothered by barking. I finally got up and went outside. I was surprised to see that there were at least 6 other dogs that had gotten into the back yard. No wonder my dog had been barking. But when I looked for him I couldn't see him among the other dogs. Suddenly the yard was full of kids and teenagers. They helped me get the dogs out of the yard and would help me find my dog. As we went down the road I saw the that number of dogs had increased to about a dozen or so.

Something about this wasn't right. And really, who were these people I was with? Could I be dreaming? It suddenly seemed much more likely that I was dreaming then walking down the road with all these random dogs and people. I took a jump up....and continued to fly.

Yes!

I very quickly remembered my goal of practicing all my bending skills. I flew to a big tree and sat on a large branch. I cupped my hands in front of me and concentrated on making fire. At first nothing happened. I wasn't too worried because fire is the easiest one for me, and I have had quite a lot of practice over the years at creating fire. So I continued to concentrate and soon saw little heat waves coming up off my hands. With a little more concentration I saw a little fire form within my cupped hands. That was good enough for me. I wanted to move on to water.

I looked at my hands. The fire slowly faded away and in it's place I saw that my hands were filled with water. That was easier than I thought it could be. I have only one memory of water bending in all my lucid dreams and that was years ago--and that cup of water had already been on the table. So I was thrilled that the water just came to be. Now for the next part. I concentrated again on the small pool of water in my hands. Soon I saw a section of water start to snake up. I pulled it with my mind and made it twist and turn. I finally made it head to my mouth where I drank it all down (that had been my plan all along--and it was quite satisfying--the more interaction with the water, the better, I say). I then saw Jeff next to me. He said he was hot. I filled my hands with water again, and this time focused on it until it became ice. It was not quite solid, still kind of slushy, but still intact enough for me to pick it up with one hand and give it to Jeff. He seemed happy with it so I moved on.

I saw that I was in the park next to the airport. I flew over to the fence and saw some small rocks sitting on the fence. I concentrated until those pebbles floated over and into my hands. I then formed a dust devil and those rock went swirling up into the very small dust devil in my hands.

I felt very satisfied that I had been able to do all four elements. At this point I think I had a false awakening. Or I lost lucidity.

I was in what was supposed to be my backyard. I was looking at my tomato plants. I noticed that I had a lot of ripe tomatoes. Many more than I had remembered seeing before. I then noticed that my squash plants were also covered in these big cool looking squash, some orange and other pink with green on one end. As excited as I felt seeing all the squash, part of me started doubting. Again, I decided that there was more chance of me being in a dream than all these squash suddenly growing in my yard (had I even planted squash this year?). No, I was dreaming again. And that was okay.

I suddenly thought about all the bending I had just done. I wasn't quite finished. I wanted to make a bigger dust devil. I concentrated on the ground in front of me and made a 6-7 foot dust devil appear. At first it was just made from random dust and debris. But then I wanted to be creative. I used my mind to lift some reddish colored sand at the base of the dust devil. I watched as it started to swirl slowly up the dust devil. It was so fascinating that I did it again with more sand. Then again. The dust devil had all these swirling stripes, spinning and spinning. I focused again and made the patterns even more complex. It was beautiful, intricate, and so symmetrical. I was in awe.

But then I remembered my next goal which was to summon some new music by Angels and Airwaves. I had been wanting to do this for a while. I hadn't been successful the last time. I hope to be this time. I saw Daniel next to me. I asked him if he had a radio or music player of sorts. He said yes, and pulled out this funny orange and yellow colored box. He pushed a button and music started playing. I told him I needed to hear some Angels and Airwaves...but not just any old Angels and Airwaves, but something new. Something they hadn't created yet. He messed around with it. Several more songs came on, but none of it was what I was looking for. Then the dream faded. And I couldn't get back.

Disembodied, I'm standing on the second floor, looking over a railing down at the main hall of this three-floor antebellum mansion filled with women waltzing to Que Sera, Sera. There's men here too, but they might as well be props, they're not what I'm here to see. A fire breaks out with no apparent cause, and I recognize what moment in time this must be; the fire here is a reflection of what's happening in reality in the place where they're sleeping. One of the women is caught in the fire and starts screaming. And then the fire's gone, and she's fine, and they go back to dancing. Though they're not aware of it, the end of the fire signified the end of their connection with reality; their sleeping bodies have died, and they won't be able to leave this dream world.

Morning of August 5, 2015. Wednesday.



More. There is always so much more. Just when I had finished “The Macaroni and Spaghetti Mystery - Solved?” (August 4, 2015), the Source decides to start playing with me again and confirm at least some of what I already knew, yet alarm me with another end-of-the-world dream. It carries much the same theme as “Explosion on the Sun” (April 26, 1972). I believe, just as with an atomic bomb, a catastrophic CME mostly only represents the waking process and the transition of energies between different levels of consciousness. I know this from “A Place in the Sky” (November 26, 2014) where I was able to “pause” the nuclear event (though it was still occurring extremely slowly, though so slowly as to not be perceivable or represent any kind of a threat) and thus my dream did not end and it became more vivid (though not quite to apex lucidity - though it did not “need” to be) and longer than usual.

In this dream, I am living with my family in a completely unfamiliar building. My mother is alive again and there are a few bags of books apparently from the library. We llive on the first floor of a building that seems somewhat commercial as the windows are like glass walls. The residence seems to be in a larger city. Along with books, there are also some music CDs and movies. For some reason, I find myself looking for a certain CD and cannot find it anywhere. I also note the variety of books, some quite large. I say something aloud about wandering why she had checked out so much as she will not have time to read all these books, or in fact, even finish one of them.

However, I realize that Zsuzsanna had also likely checked out several items from the library, including several children’s books. There are at least four larger bags full and I continue to search for something I was sure was there before but cannot find it now (recurring dream situation).

Meanwhile, around this same time period, there had been some solar flare and aurora activity that was not threatening in any way. It seems to have stopped. The time seems to be just after noon.

I notice one very odd DVD cover, a movie I am not familiar with and I am very surprised my mother had checked it out, as it looks like a very amateurish adult (X-rated) movie. I then see that the unlikely DVD had somehow duplicated itself so that there are now two copies, though this does not trigger lucidity. The cover is extraordinarily ugly and disturbing and vaguely reminds me of a vampire theme (though is more lamprey-like facially). It features a girl with a huge perfectly circular mouth, so large as to almost be twice its normal size and it almost seems I can make out gills on the inside (on each side). I find myself staring at this imagery in a typical “frozen” surreal dream event (similar to “Dennis the Cyclops” from June 1, 1988). The “lamprey girl” apparently seems to only serve as an oral sex vessel in the movie (I assume), though this does not make much sense in afterthought, as her mouth is far too large to be able to give pleasure in any way. As I continue to gawk at this horrendous image, an unknown female (possibly an implied secretary or nanny) comes into the room and asks me about the solar flares and CMEs, as she says “the sky is flashing again”.

I go out to the front room and notice that the sky is indeed flashing (that is, the light in the room is cycling as brighter and dimmer in perfect timing). I look out and see a very vivid and realistic scene of strips of plasma coming down from the clouds and setting things on fire when they hit. It seems like it may be the end of the world. Through the glass walls on the opposite side of the room, I see Julia (from “Under the Dome”) running towards our building with her side on fire and smoke coming out. (This scene was obviously influenced by the “Ejecta” episode of “Under the Dome” though it is not her that is killed by the fire.) I first thought she was my wife (before she got closer to the windows) but then I realize my wife is probably safe inside. Still, I wonder how long this will last and if it really is the end.

Shift. I remember the entry “The Macaroni and Spaghetti Mystery - Solved?” and realize what I wrote was correct, though there is more. Though macaroni does indeed represent the human brain (because of its appearance) and implied mental energies, “macaroni” is also an in-dream play on “my corona” (my crown). This causes me to reflect on another layer of “As the Worm Turns” (May 17, 2014). The worms falling out of my hair and becoming dried elbow macaroni are a play on the loss of “my corona” (my crown) in that I was leaving the dream state and no longer the king (though I was not lucid in that dream anyway - it was just more vivid than usual).

Also, the typical day-to-day precognitive layer follows (though as stated before I do not always document it online); my wife opened a letter from the library shortly after my dream and it said she had one overdue CD - which included songs from the “Twilight” (vampire) movie. I had no way of knowing this otherwise.

This also influenced me to have another look at “Dennis the Cyclops” due to it reminding me of the “lamprey girl” to some extent. Here are my words from that entry from my dream of June 1, 1988: “The ‘Dennis the Menace’ comic prior to this date was a gag where he said 'Guess what, mom! All the mirrors in the house look like ME!’ (and the one on this date - not yet seen at the time - having him ask Mr. Wilson, who is digging, 'Who buries the worms here in the first place?’ - nothing I know of relating to any 'explanation’ for this imagery other than the eye being partly mirror-like).”

Note the “worms” play again right after the unusual reference to what could be a play on Universal Mind (“All the mirrors in the house look like ME!”). Also, June 1, 2001 (not only exactly thirteen years after my dream but also exactly thirteen years after the “worms in the ground” panel he drew) is when Hank Ketcham, the artist of “Dennis the Menace”, passed away.

Was in my work place with a college he was asking about my brothers (who are married now) as if they were still boys - I looked at him pondering and then said" this is strange, I must be dreaming" - I became Lucid
As I stared at him aware he was a DC he changed from being a college into a strange man and his face kept changing..." What do you represent to me?" I asked
He didn't answer but his face started to melt. I repeated the question loosing lucidity for a bit as I did so - but then then I noticed small spontaneous fires starting up in quite a few spots across and around the room ( a sewing room so there is lots to burn!) This made me realise I was dreaming again although I tried to put the fire out at first ha ha. I turned back to the DC and he was laughing at me wildly " Tell me what you represent!" I shouted - I can see I got a bit too involved here and ended up back in my physical - I am not Usually so interested in DC's but this one really hooked me in- lol


A few false awakenings this mornings also but only realising after - one where I had a good bit of awareness tho ; a little girl playing nearby to where I lay " can you see me?" I asked
" Yes - I can see you " She answered
I had asked because the boarder wasn't clear as to whether I was awake or asleep...could still feel my physical world but also knew other world was close by by hearing it - not seeing.
After she had answered I tried gently to turn my head to see her in an effort to join the dream world but my physical body was woken then too much!

Wake up in a dream, lucid, I'm at a house with some people. One guy's brother is a soldier, and not very nice, he almost tries to kill me, but I have the powers of air and fire and he backs off. We all go to a dance, then sleep and wake up again, but in a different dream world.

A woman and I are running from a pursuer, another woman. "Faster, faster!" the first woman urges me. "Don't look back, it will slow you down." I don't see why I have to run away, but fine, I'll play along... I do look back, however, and I'm surprised how close the pursuer is. This motivates me to try to put some distance between me and her, so I run harder... and yet I can't seem to make much gain on her. I'm perplexed: I know I should be able to do this, I'm dreaming, it's not like I have to rely on my physical stamina. I wonder if the answer is in running with more short strides rather than trying to cover more distance with each step, much as one is advised to run in WL, so I try out variations. I'm making progress, but concentrating so hard on my running form is becoming tedious. "Imagining running is almost as hard as the real thing!" I comment to the woman fleeing with me. Getting bored with this situation I decide to put an end to it, and succeed in sprinting ahead to the point where I can turn a corner and leave the pursuer's field of vision, at which point I figure I've made a fair escape.

However, it turns out that my pursuer had an accomplice: I now find myself in a struggle with a huge brawny man with a shaggy brown beard. I perceive him as a Viking, and I'm aware that his name is Torvald. He is connected somehow with the woman who was chasing me earlier, and is likewise an antagonist. Our struggle manifests partially as a kind of combat, but it feels as much like a battle of dream control as a physical battle.

I easily resist Torvald's initial attempts to subdue me, but his immense confidence makes me wonder if I should doubt my own. I go on the offensive and try to put him out of action more permanently, trying various tactics to destroy his body. For instance, at one point I imagine his body being crushed by a great weight from above, and although this has him stretched out supine on the ground for as long as I'm actively thinking it, he is soon back on his feet. I try crushing his heart and throat from inside his body, but he is only briefly inconvenienced.

I wonder if fire would do the trick, and visualize Torvald's body burning to ash. Though I've said nothing aloud, he appears to understand my intentions, and rather than actively resisting like he did with my other attacks, he simply denies the efficacy of this approach. "Fire won't work," he tells me flatly. I refuse to acknowledge this and continue contentrating on the image of fire consuming him. "Fire won't work," Torvald tells me again. I'm thinking: how could this be? It's my dream, isn't it? Fire should work if I say it should work. So I redouble my focus on the fire. With patient indifference, Torvald insists: "Fire won't work." I find this disconcerting, because apparently my confidence is unable to overcome his. Aren't I the dreamer? But there is no time for philosophical questions; we are still in combat. I switch tactics: if he is resistant to fire, how about ice? I start to try to freeze him—even if it doesn't destroy him it might at least slow him down temporarily—but Torvald has found the opening he needed and pins me to the ground.

Torvald's inexplicable ability to ignore my attempts to burn him makes me wonder if I should worry that he could actually harm me. But I have a superpower too: as the dreamer, I am invulnerable... aren't I? I decide to play it safe, and secretly project my "real" identity to the roof of a nearby building. It is a large square brick structure about 8–10 stories high, and I crouch behind the low brick railing that surrounds the flat roof, tempted to peek out at the combat occurring down below but not wanting to let Torvald see me and discover the trick. So I transfer my perceptions back to my body on the ground, which I now regard as a mere DC, and thus disposable. If my attacker succeeds in destroying this body, it won't matter: I've secured my identity elsewhere. Torvald actually glances up toward the roof when I think this, and I quickly realize that I need to guard my thoughts as well.

"Do you have someone watching me?" Torvald asks. I am relieved, because although he suspects that there is an observer on the roof, he hasn't seen through my whole trick—he doesn't seem to recognize that the person up there is actually me. I project a new thought toward him, gleefully: I recall how undercover police have been tracking him, and that I've been using our encounter to distract and delay him until they were in position. Maybe none of this was true earlier, but it doesn't matter: this is a dream battle, so it is true now! When Torvald looks back down at me, I grin mockingly and deliberately call him by the wrong name, "Harald," just to annoy him further. The game is up, and my undercover officers move in and force Torvald to release me. I'm not sure what happens to him after that... pleased with having solved the dilemma, I simply walk away.

What's next? The last incident was not one that I had intended, but now I'm free to work on tasks. I enter a wide clearing and wonder if I should try the Dragon Age task again. I've always liked the idea of aligning dream space with fictional environments from books, films, or games, but I'm still trying to figure out how to do it. I suppose the first step would be to remember a concrete environment from the game and try to insert aspects of it here. I played DA:I just last night, so I should be able to access those memories... but as I seek them out I feel a tremor of dream instability, and decide not to push it. If there's a risk of waking, I should put that task off until later. For now, there are still a few TOTMs I haven't tried this month, and I decide to work on those.

"Taste a rainbow." That one is easy to remember. I imagine a rainbow in the sky, and produce something very faint and not at all rainbow-colored. The colors are largely ochres and earthtones, and not even in proper lines but arranged in a more tesselated pattern over the arch. I'm not being a perfectionist at this point, so I accept this as a "rainbow" and shrink it into a stick of candy in my hand. The colors have changed in the process, and for some reason the candy stick is white with swirls of red and blue. Still not rainbow-colored! But I take a bite. The texture is interesting, lots of little pieces that crunch between my teeth, but the flavor is a real disappointment: vague, muted, and blandly sweet. Apart from "sweet," no other descriptors really present themselves. This won't do. A rainbow should taste more unusual than this! I decide to start over.

This time I put more work into the rainbow itself. I first visualize it, then focus on the faint transparent arch until it becomes more clearly visible, but this also has the consequence of making it more material. Now it appears like a physical object, a two-dimensional vertical banner in an arch about ten feet high and twenty feet long, right in front of me. I work on correcting the pattern so that it has rainbow colors in properly aligned stripes... I see some improvement, although it is a C+ effort at best. It looks better than my last attempt, anyway, so I approach the "rainbow" and try to take a bite directly out of it. The experience is like... chewing on a shower curtain. It really feels like I've put a sheet of plastic in my mouth, although the material is soft enough to crush between my teeth. Again the texture is more prominent than the taste. I put all my attention on the flavor, trying to detect anything describable, and think maybe I get some underlying fruity notes, but again it remains vague and uninteresting. Taste and smell are the least developed of my dream senses... I wonder if I could improve them if I worked at it?

I feel like I have adequately completed the task, anyway, and wonder what to try next. In all my efforts with the rainbows I had hardly paused to note all the people sitting at various tables around this clearing, like picnickers, but observing them now, I figure it might be fun to try the magic show. What would a stage magician do? I guess the most basic tricks involve having something up one's hat or one's sleeve? I notice that I am completely naked, which has long since ceased to embarrass me in dreams, but gives me a mischievous idea.

"What's up my sleeve?" I start circling among the various tables, challenging the audience members to come up with a response. One of the first responses is: "Following a guy from Eton to [...]?" (I forgot the second place name.) This answer reminds me of the earlier scene, and how I resolved the conflict with Torvald. This DC must have been one of my officers! "Are you an undercover cop?" I ask him in reply. He grudgingly nods. "Not anymore!" I'm joking about how he has just blown his cover, but it also feels like an appropriate analogy to my own lack of sleeves... I'm not "undercover" either.

I continue asking, "What's up my sleeve?" and collect various other responses from the audience, all of which were non-sequiturs... but I reasoned that the illogic of the question itself (since there was no sleeve) invited such creative responses. After hearing from seven different people, I realized that I might have trouble remembering all this when I woke up, so I stopped and went over their answers again, one by one, to help fix them in memory. Already I had trouble recalling two of the answers, but one of the DCs helpfully reminded me, additionally pointing out that the answers varied between the metaphorical (things that never could go up a sleeve) and the literal ("Three shekels" was one of these answers, I think). Meanwhile I was getting ready for the grand finale to my show, when I would reveal my own answer to the question. I had been planning on the groaningly obvious "Nothing!" and was ready for the big reveal when I noticed that something had changed... now I was wearing clothes, including a short-sleeved shirt. I realized that if I was going to go for the groaningly obvious at this point, I would have to answer "My arm!"

I felt myself start waking up, and I already had a lot to remember and report so I didn't resist the process. I woke up slowly enough that I was able to concentrate on those seven answers from the DCs and hold them in mind, with what felt like excellent clarity and accuracy. And then something happened... as I crossed the threshold, despite all my care and preparation, the memories abruptly tattered, the details dissolving. The only one of the seven answers I could still remember, and that incompletely, was the first—and that I suspect only because it was anchored by its reference to the earlier scene.

Mazikeen's picking up a crow for me, telling it that it's not going to get out of our deal. There's always an excuse.

"What excuse?" says the crow. "I'm not trying anything. I'm just pointing out I've got mouths to feed."

Many people do. But she counts the children in the nest, six of them. She initially seems not to care, saying something about distributing its belongings; but then she says something about giving them time to "grow into it." The crow's got one more year.

(Woke up. Back to sleep.)

A group of people sitting around a round table, while I'm standing. There's a woman who is composed of three women superimposed over each other, two living, one dead and decayed but still conscious due to her connection to the other two. I'm speaking to one of the living ones, Lily, the one who belongs to this reality, and offering a way to separate her from the other two. She has doubts. The other two are in favor of it. They ultimately agree.

Later, I'm reading an account of the deaths of that group who'd been sitting around the table, a kind of organization I'd led. I'd made a deal on behalf of those three women, and to hold up my end of the deal, I was away for a long time; I think of this as abandoning that group. There was a fire. I'm reading a note to the effect that the group itself will reappear in some form or another, but the people I'd abandoned are dead.

Morning of June 5, 2015. Friday.



This is one of five more memorable dreams of this morning (my dream memory usually ranging from six to nine clearer ones) and has the recurring presence of a snake - which usually makes a dream more vivid and focused for some reason (with the snake sometimes seemingly being the most well-rendered feature), sometimes even lucid. Since very early childhood, I have been aware of how a snake is sometimes metaphorical for the human intestine (such as with either indigestion or hunger pangs) though other times related to something else, sometimes literal, sometimes associated with pain in the fingers (especially if the fangs are seen), sometimes associated with the human spine and temporarily greater back pain depending on context. (This does not always include the cobra, which typically has completely different associations for me.)



My dream is firstly of the type that is not very well-rendered and with the indoor-outdoor ambiguity. My wife and I are seemingly outside (though with vague indoor features) in an unknown area though I know there are mountains “behind” us to the south, narrowly ranging east and west. Over time, it seems as if we actually are outside near an embankment.

I soon notice a snake to my right and under a few smaller branches and debris. However, there is no sustained wariness or concern as I soon see that it is dead. A little later though, there is a live one crawling about and I get the impression that it is highly venomous. It apparently leaves the area without incident, but there is still concern. My youngest son is wandering about for a short time. The ground is hard grayish dirt for the most part. There seems to be a very vague essence of being in the backyard in Cubitis, but it does not clearly seem as such and may only be an association. It really does not look anything like the area (especially with the mountains beyond).

My wife Zsuzsanna somehow contacts someone on a radio and it seems relative to a parks and recreation communication regarding safety. A man in a helicopter shows up and flies over the area checking for the presence and activity (crawling direction) of any snakes. He later walks up with a temporary map saying how they are mostly in the mountain belt at this time.

However, there is still the one snake that did not actually leave the area. I have a book of matches and manage to set the snake on fire after a few attempts, and which takes a few minutes to send it completely ablaze. It does not move much during this time. It may be an in-dream metaphor for lower back pain in this case, which has sparsely and randomly occurred throughout my life. (There is also a type of firework called Black Snake which I have not used since 1990, which may have served as a reference for the situation.) Again, although the snake seemingly represents the human spine in this case and the fire may relate to back pain (though fire often is associated with growing conscious awareness though of course such would be required to perceive pain in the first place), it may also relate to dream state alchemy and eliminating the pain.

Morning of May 8, 2015. Friday.



My dream’s setting, which is meant to represent our home, is rendered with quite a bit of detail, though it does not seem that familiar (even in comparison to various past false renderings of our home as dreams typically do). There is concern about some sort of cable box for television (and possibly with computer connections as well) that is illogically hanging near the window at a slight angle, a bit more than halfway up the wall, in what seems to be the living room. Over time, I put my hand on it and clearly feel intense heat. I can even vividly feel the heat on the palm of my hand from about a foot away. This becomes a concern of course, as it may eventually cause a fire. A small fire soon starts near the box, but we put it out right away with a spray bottle (probably filled with water).

Time passes, the television remains on, and I eventually see reddish orange flashes outside the windows though it is not that late and I think the sun is still out. I go outside and see that the entire front of the house is on fire, but in several different smaller sections near the roof, each area on fire being just above each window, of which there are at least five areas. I get the garden hose and manage to put them all out, but I also note numerous small clean splinters of wood falling to the ground, which I even remark upon in my dream, though this oddly does not seem that problematic, especially as they are so small, almost like the house is “shedding” slightly curved toothpicks.

I realize that the house we live in (in-dream) is not suitable to have cable television - since we seem to be able to have the television on only for a few minutes before the box overheats enough to cause a fire. Strange dream “logic”.

I'm wading through icy water, tracking someone down. It's dark, the water looks black, and there's this mist in the air, I can't see very far. There's bodies floating in the water, wrapped in cloth. There's another man here with me, he calls me by the name of Logan. I'm focused on the dampness in the air - it caused problems earlier when we couldn't get a fire to catch.

Thinking about fire makes me see another time, standing in a large stone hall, standing off to the left of the woman presiding over some ceremony, having to remain still throughout her speech, wearing armor, uncomfortable. There were rows of people arranged in front of us, and as she called each of them up she'd hand them a lit candle, symbolic, but I was looking at those candles and thinking of them as never enough to hold off the chill.

Back in the icy water, we've found the person we were looking for in a little area surrounded by bare trees. He's standing off to one side and watching an old woman perform some kind of ceremony, something like a funeral for the old ruler here - I have a vague impression of something strung up among the trees, either the last ruler's bones themselves or at least something representing them. She knows who we are. She tells me that just because I've killed the old ruler, that doesn't make this place mine. The territory is passed down through the blood, and there's still someone with the elf blood to inherit it - the man we've been tracking down. He's not related to the old ruler, and he's more human than anything else, as is she, but that doesn't matter; this territory will remain in the hands of his people, not mine.

The man in question objects to this - this is a situation being forced on him. He tells me he's sorry. The guy who'd tracked him down with me makes some sarcastic comment, telling him to quit the humble act; but I believe him, this isn't something he'd wanted. Nonetheless, the old woman's in the right; there's nothing I can do here, we've lost. I tell him it's all right. It's only when I speak and hear the tone in my voice that I (the dreamer side of me) realize he and I (the character side of me) had been sleeping together; we're most likely going to have to end that now.

The old woman resumes her ceremony, now involving him. It doesn't take long, just a few words. There's a wreath of pale yellow flowers which he accepts from her; as soon as the ceremony's done he drops it and it falls apart in the water. I'm thinking of the moment I first met him, when he'd been locked up in a cell.