VivianVector

Really potent dream state. I had been drinking at a party that night, but I had still never experienced dreaming quite like this, alcohol or no. There was no REM rebound either, dreaming began almost immediately.

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Lying back into the hammock, still a little intoxicated from the party, I begin to drift into sleep. I am in a room off to the side with some other people who have turned in for the night, while in the lounge room a small group of party-goers keep going strong. My eyes shut, the music doesn't bother me.

I am flying over a fantastical modern city. Huge buildings stretch up into the sky, incredibly detailed. The way my three dimensional perspective shifts is incredibly realistic. As I have experienced before, the movement itself causes the visuals to solidify rapidly.

I am wandering through this dreamworld. I find myself in a penthouse apartment of sorts. There are many well-dressed, influential people here. Some hold glasses of champagne, others speak in hushed tones. It seems that there is an event of some description on. The rooms are vast and the decor minimalist. I am definitely amongst the upper echelon of society, but there are distinct underworld currents here and powerful ones at that. Women in stunning dresses sip at cocktails, a man deals cards at a table, and there are people coming and going from an oriental meeting room. I try to peer inside but the security is eyeing me suspiciously.

I wander into a side room. There are people here being 'sold' for exorbitant amounts of money, but they are all very keen to be here. There's roughly half a dozen of them, dressed in white robes, male and female and all glamourously beautiful. They aren't slaves or prostitutes as such, more like high-status consorts whose loyalty is bought, trophies to be displayed. There are a few people bidding here. By entering the room, I have unwittingly entered myself in the auction, but I am not at all dressed or prepared for such an event. A price is named for me. It is low compared to the others, but still in figures that I could not expect to see in my lifetime.

A pixie-eyed man, one of the actual party-goers from the waking world, leans over and speaks to me.
"Not bad at all, but I will attract a much higher sum."
He did, of course. He wasn't gloating so much as stating fact, this was their profession.
"What other purpose is there to life than to be as beautiful and glamourous as possible?" He believed that it only made sense for everyone to aspire to this ideal.

It was then that I had a 'false awakening' in the apartment. I get out of the hammock and stagger into the lounge room. The party-goers are still up, awake and energetic, but very aware that they are dreaming.
"This is what we do," the pixie-eyed man explained. "We go out exploring this world at night. We thought that as you were here, we would try to wake you up as well."
It had worked for me, but all the others who had turned in early were still sleeping in the room I had left. They were too deeply asleep to be pulled into the dream.

They began to explain that they went by aliases while dreaming to protect their physical identities. It made sense to me, except that the pixie-eyed man had been making quite the name for himself as a rogue lucid-awakener by the name 'Anderson'. I got the Matrix reference. It seemed he had been pulling a lot of people into his dream adventures recently. I recalled seeing his name at an earlier time, somewhere in another dream, and warned him to be careful.

It was too late. Eyes were already upon him and his group. An illuminati-style organisation had taken interest in his activities and decided to put a stop to them. Their methods involved misleading and blinding individuals with familiar glamours. They wouldn't even know that they had been restricted to only existing within their own personal dreamworlds.

We had to flee, running out into the corridors. Desperately trying to escape the clutch of our pursuers. The party was split, we were forced to break up into smaller groups and head out into different directions. But we kept getting lost, funnelled only down the paths that the organisation dictated. And then we would awake again in that lounge room. Lights off, only two of us this time. We'd look at each other and run out into the hallways. Awakened again, this time a couple of others. We were all confused, scared, frightened. Awake again, and again, and then I opened my eyes.

I was physically awake this time, lying in the hammock. The very people I had been dreaming about were in the lounge room outside, dancing and doing shots. But I could't hold onto my waking awareness and fell back beneath the waves. Awake again, same lounge room, but this time I was alone.
I ran out into the hallway, none from the group in sight. I followed the paths through the building desperately, and finally this time I came to a location I had not seen before. The hall curved around into a room with an alcove and a tall window looking out over the cloud-shrouded buildings beyond. The city I had seen as I flew over it at the beginning of my journey.

I stopped, looking out over the breath-taking view. I became aware of two figures that had been waiting here. One was a man, silent, clothed and hooded in black robes. I had a sensation of knowing him, a name; the Angel. The other was a man in a simple work suit. He was from the organisation, or at least knew of my predicament. It appeared they had been speaking before my arrival. The man from the organisation approached me and began to converse with me. He explained that given the circumstances, I would be free to go.

The dream shifted and time was lost. I found myself walking through a busy train station. There were escalators and shops, commuters going to and from platforms. I wandered around, perhaps keeping an eye out for anyone I may know, but I needed no goods or transport.

Some troubling self-esteem dreams this month. I was gripped with the notion that my friends despised me. Despite knowing that they were just dreams, I was still emotionally affected by it. Thankfully, by the end of the month, I had worked through this issue. A lot of hypnagogia this month as well. It's been interesting to say the least.

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Some strange, oily hypnagogia. I see intense but limited visuals. A painted white spiral staircase. An empty apartment room with french windows, people standing on the patio beyond. I am gaining traction, but I get the sense that I am positing my awareness inside another person. He moves without my guidance, beginning to stumble, perhaps due to my influence. He turns and falls to the ground, reaching a hand out hoping to catch himself. I hear one of his associates call his name, and then again but closer and far louder. It is so sharp that it awakens me completely.

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I re-attempt a lucid technique that I had tried once before. As I lay awaiting sleep, I begin to count.
"1, I am dreaming. 2, I am dreaming."
As I do so, hypnagogic voices begin to intrude. They sigh and sound disappointed, and then begin the try to interrupt my counting. Some speaking over the top of me, others counting backwards trying to muddle my continuity. I press on regardless. They are annoying but not hostile.

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I dream of a crime scene. A thick-set man enters an underground bar frequented by those with criminal affiliations. It is empty but for the barkeep and his staff. He asks the barkeep to recount the events of the previous night. A young man had become drunk and rowdy. In his inebriated state he had stumbled and fallen, punching a drink off a table by accident. The drink's owner, the man now standing in the bar, had been intoxicated himself. Enrage by the slight, he had instantly drawn his pistol and fired three bullets into the younger man. The barkeep vows not to tell a single other soul about the event.
The next day I take the tram to work and we pass by a road blocked off by police tape. A man had been murdered in the early hours of the morning, affiliated with the local mob. Three bullets.

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I am at a supermarket but all the fresh produce looks old and stale. I am offered a punnet of raspberries, but they look rotten. I eat some anyway, and instantly spit them out. They taste sour and foul. The sensation of taste is strong.

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My arms and legs are all tangled and tied up in knots, restricting my movement. I beseech a male friend for help and he assists, untangling my limbs. He pulls a note out of my back pocket, indicating that it may explain the issue. I unfold the note and read it.
The top line reads; 'You need to quit smoking.'
It is followed by a single word at the bottom, bracketed as though an after thought, but capitalise for emphasis; '(CUNT)'
I am so shocked by it that the memory sticks strong in my mind. The next day I begrudgingly decide to quit smoking.

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We are a team of soldiers on a perilous mission to vanquish a great alien intellect within its own metallic domain. Through holes in the floor, we can view the next dangerous stage of our journey. We meet a man who is besieged by the same entity, but he is also caught up in the illusions that it presents. Through the holes, he sees his own home and family. We warn him that he is too close to the being and this is a sign that he is endangered. He deliberates on what to do.

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I am in the back garden of my grandparent's house, a memory from childhood. My cohesion is low, but the detail is still quite high. I go inside. The house is quiet, but items are left out on the table. The room feels lived in, as though somebody had been here not too long ago. I flip the light switch, and nothing happens. I sigh, miss the lucidity cue, and turn to my left, instantly spying the breaker box. I find it odd that for some reason it is now located in the kitchen. The door is open with only a single fuse switch. I flick it on and the lights spring to life. I turn back around and there is a tall man wearing dark clothes leaning against the sink behind me.