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Dream Elements
by Alex Reynard
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AUTHOR'S NOTE: I've been writing down my particularly memorable dreams since 1999. My dream file is about 720k at the moment. Not all of them are interesting to anyone but me though. So I went through the whole thing, snipping away, leaving only those dreams that 1) have a coherent story and/or 2) that I could imagine anyone actually wanting to read. There are a lot of storylike dreams here with a fair amount of celebrity cameos, luscious visuals and deeper meanings. But these are just the cream of the crop. Most dreams I have are short, jumbled, anxiety-driven rehashes of recent events and bits of movies. Though every now and then, my unconscious mind will produce a gem. Here's a few.





*****


-Mouse Movie

I vaguely remember a part of a much larger dream (involving an incredibly 3D Aladdin video game or movie or something), being at a friend's house with a lot of little kids and watching a video of a movie I'd seen years ago as a kid, liked a lot, then forgotten almost entirely.

The animation is really beautiful, like The Chipmunk Adventure mixed with Steven Martin's shiny style. There are several scenes of mouse adventurers including a Nordic-kinda mouse with flat blue eyes, tan fur, hide boots and vest, with long, lightning-bolt-like wings flying determinedly and solemnly through clouds. There is also a group of South American treasure-hunting mice, led by a stout, mustachioed mouse dressed in shiny gold, pepper green and pepper red clothing, aided by his similarly-garbed crew as they lower themselves down the side of an enormous gold Inca statue that reaches up to the sky. Then later they explore another huge Greek statue that's partially underwater, in neat little propeller-crafts. Also, there is another group of handicapped mousies. A pretty pink-shirted Teresa-Brisby-like mousette in a wheelchair is the leader, aided by her two grey-furred brothers. They are hanging desperately from the girl's wheelchair, which is hanging on the end of a rope down a dark cave, yet the girl mouse seems unafraid and optimistic.

It seems that from what I can remember of the plot, they are all in a race in a big magic land, all looking to find a treasure. There is also a group of cocky main-character types led by a handsome blond mouse guy with a heart of gold. I don't really remember seeing this group, but kinda recall that in the end, they are neck-and-neck with the handicapped mousies, and they let the girl and her brothers win the prize because they deserve it most. I really liked everything about this dream snippet and could clearly remember wanting to find this movie and get a copy of it!


*****


-The X-Files: Predator

I've had many X-files themed dreams before, but never one as detailed and script-like as this one. It starts out that I'm going to tape a rerun of the show on a little TV in my room. I even remember getting a snack and sitting down on the floor to watch it. (BTW, it's an earlier-style episode. Season four-ish)

Mulder and Scully have been told of a case in a small, cut-off town in the Washington or Dakota area (not sure where) that has been known for years as a hotspot for all sorts of weird phenomena. Mulder has always hoped for a chance to investigate a case here, but so far, all the reports have either been too small to concern the FBI or too bizarre to believe. However, when the two agents learn the nature of the case, Mulder's enthusiasm drops. A child-killer has been on the loose for decades there, killing once every five to seven years or so. No pattern. Up until now, when the deaths have been occurring with alarming regularity. The killer then drives past the victim's parents house and dumps the body in the street in front of their house. Scully is saddened by the case, but Mulder becomes enraged. He can't imagine a monster worse than this, and wants to leave right away to devote himself fully to this case, even though it may or may not be an X-file.

As soon as M&S arrive, they begin to feel the strangeness of the town. Odd little coincidences and out-of place happenings happen almost as soon as they arrive. It's summer there, and most of the snow has gone, but the place still looks like the kind of town prepared for (and usually getting) a monster of a snowfallevery year. The agents check in with the local P.D.. The Sheriff is unsettlingly jovial and proud of the town, relating to M&S all sorts of weird things that have gone on, in an attempt to impress them apparently.

SHERIFF: "One time, few years back, a fellow here started, one day outta the blue, glowing like a lightbulb! I mean, really bright, like when you shine a flashlight through your fingers. He was fine for a few days, and more than a dozen or so people saw him. Then one day he suddenly just blew up walking down the street! Damndest thing."
SCULLY: "Did you, ah, actually see any of this yourself, sir?"
SHERIFF: "Not the glowin' part, but I was on the scene first after he blew up. I examined that body and you know, there's not a doubt in my mind that that man exploded *from the inside out*!
SCULLY (world-wearily): I'd believe it.
MULDER: Say, uh, we had one of those once, didn't we, Scully?
SCULLY: *rolls eyes* Probably.

When the agents go to inspect where the latest body was found, the Sheriff tells them all about it in sickening detail. They are clustered around a large discolored spot on the pavement of a very bland-looking suburban street with a lot of short, identical houses. Mulder examines everything with the eyes of a hawk. The sheer brutality of the killings and the killer repulse him; the killer appears to do the killings with his bare hands. Mulder's taking the case personally. As the agents and a bunch of officers investigate, the Sheriff looks up to see a little girl sitting on the porch of the murdered boy's house, looking pensive and much underdressed for the cold weather. When he looks away, and then back, she's gone. This same thing happens to Scully later.

Scully and Mulder check out the earlier cases back at the station, and drive around looking at earlier crime scenes. The case has absolutely no leads and it's maddening. [This next part wasn't in the dream, but was an earlier dream that kinda fits in.] That evening, Mulder and Scully stroll over to the high school football stadium behind the station and lay up in the top seats, looking up at the sky. The two of them talk for a while about what their lives have become and what their work has made out of them. They imagine what life would be like if they'd never joined the FBI at all. Suddenly, a huge bright light and a loud hum burst on over them. It's an alien spacecraft, come to abduct them! However, when they look closer, it's just the night watchman having turned on one of the stadium lights above them to see who it was.

After the second day of investigating with no leads, Mulder is getting discouraged. He goes back to the latest crime scene and just walks around, thinking to himself. It's sunset and the whole street looks both eerie and beautiful. Suddenly, Mulder sees the little girl. Instead of vanishing, she starts talking to Mulder. She tells him that she saw the killer, knows exactly who he is. Mulder is incredibly excited by this, but when he loses eye contact with her for a second, he finds himself standing alone in the middle of the street without a soul around.

The girl had said the killer is a man known only as Freddie. The kinda guy every small town has; the hermit that lives on the edge of town and has a brain that doesn't work quite right. The sheriff takes the agents up to where Freddie was last known to live, even though he hasn't been seen in a while. The place is a small house with a gigantic, wide, tree-sprinkled backyard surrounded by woods on all sides. Unfortunately, he's long gone by now, and the house gives up no good clues anyway. The only thing of note is in the backyard. It's still cold enough up here that the snow hasn't melted, also, a layer of ice has preserved it as well. There is a strange 'track' running through the snow. Obviously well-worn, but looping crazily around without direction. No one can make any sense of it. Nevertheless, Mulder feels that surely this is an important clue.

However, after another two days, nothing has yet come of it. Mulder is spending nearly all his time in the killer's house, trying desperately to understand him and thereby catch him. Scully is worried that he's letting the case get to him even beyond his usual tenacity. Mulder tells her he understands the concern, but he HAS to solve the case.

That evening, just before the sun sets, Mulder is thinking about how the children must have felt. He looks out the window and sees a young fox standing there looking right back at him. Mulder puzzles over this a bit, then goes back to his thoughts when the fox skitters away. A few minutes later, Mulder hears an ear-piercing scream and bolts out of the house to see what it is. It's the fox again, a hawk divebombed it, trying to injure it enough to be able to feast on it. As Mulder watches, the fox does its best to elude the hawk, but can't since it's leaving a trail of blood behind on the snow. Mulder rushes out and whips off his trenchcoat to shoo the hawk away. The fox struggles only a little when Mulder scoops her up in his coat and carries her back to the house. Mulder gives the fox some food and treats her wounds.

Then, he looks out the window at the trail of blood the fox left on the snow. He freezes. The look in his eyes says he's suddenly got something. He runs outside with the fox, finally realizing what the crazy, twisting path in the snow means. It's exactly like the blood trail! The killer thinks of himself as a wild predator. He took the victims back to his house, injured them, then turned them loose to hunt them! The path was the path the child made running from the killer, and it's well worn because the killer walked it over and over to recapture the thrill of the hunt! Mulder can see every stage of the hunt now, and traces it back to a large, round flat area. "This is it! This is where it started!" He shouts out loud, still holding the fox, and describes every step of the hunt out loud as the camera pans back to let us see the path from the air.

Returning from commercial break, we see the main strip of the town. a few cars pass, coming towards us, one of them Scully's. Then, in the upper righthand corner of the screen, a UFO darts by, just quick enough that we're not sure if we really saw it.

Unfortunately, at this point, the VCR screwed up and I didn't get to see the rest of the episode. I woke up. But I've got a good idea how it could end; Mulder takes Scully up in the sheriff chopper to view the whole area from above, looking for another path. They find several. And one is being made as they watch! The chopper lands and Mulder leaps out, gun drawn, and after a bit of tense cat-and-mouse, brings the killer down.

After the case, Scully is looking through the files on Freddie when she gasps. She shows Mulder a picture of his first victim; his own daughter, the girl Scully and the sheriff saw on the porch. Mulder is not at all surprised. But then he realizes why the fox was there to lead him to the answer; the fox _was_ the girl's ghost, in a different form.

On the drive back home, Scully asks Mulder how DID he figure out the killer's mindset. "A little vixen told me," he replies. As the car passes, we see the fox sitting by the side of the road, watching them. The camera does a close-up and we see that the fox has the exact same eyes as the girl's ghost...


*****


-Don't Be A Hero

I have just been accepted at this really-prestigious and well-known young superhero academy. Kinda like Xavier's school for mutants. Only in this universe, superheroes are all well-known and are regarded by the general public like pop idols. And most of them act that way too.

I look a little like Matt Damon with a personality like Tenchi Masaki. My power is that I can generate copies of myself. I'm not too good at it yet, I can only get three or four of me at a time, five max. I've never specifically wanted to be a hero, but since I was born like this, I take the Peter Parker view of things. Since I got it, may as well use it.

I'm surprised I've even been accepted at the academy. It's really world-famous and all. But I'm glad I'm going to at least have the chance to learn more about my powers and help develop them.

However, it's soon clear to me that that ain't gonna happen. The school seems more like an acting school than a hero school. Much to my annoyance, most of the other young heros here only want to learn how to look good in front of cameras. I'm especially annoyed since a lot of them have much better powers than me, and they're barely using them.

For a few days, I have a room with a few other new guys (none of whom are very rememberable) before I get to move on to the permanent guys' dorm. They let me know about it pretty late at night, so I try to sneak in there quietly to check the place out. Of course, I'm trying to sneak past superheroes and they all wake up to find me standing there in the middle of the room like some kinda pervert. I sheepishly tell them I'm just having a look around. And with all their eyes on me, looking like they wouldn't mind beating the snot out of me. I notice they have a buncha video games and snack machines in the back. Lucky them. And I notice the only two remaining beds look pretty uncomfortable.

For the most part I realize I'm the school outcast. The guys are all macho testosterone-fueled bullies-at-heart and the girls are cliquey, self-absorbed and look at me like I'm a gnat.

I eventually am given a costume. It's green, purple and gold with a bunch of 'V' shapes. It looks way too dorky for my tastes. I try to think up a good superhero name. They give me a really bland, generic one instead.

Me: "How about Xtimes?"
Them: "Sounds like an X-files fan's newsletter!"
"It's a math thing!"
"No one's gonna understand that. You're Multiman.
"Multiman?!? Good god, that's lame!"

However, I soon get a chance to shine. On the front lawn of the hero school, the principal (non-super person) shows off the new crop of young superdudes before the news cameras. The buff and pretty ones act like preening chickens. I feel like a Barbie doll on display.

Suddenly, the ground shakes and pretty much explodes. This black, oily substance shoots up from everywhere. It only takes a second to realize that the black web of oil is alive! The various blobs of it form into humanesque shape, finally coalescing into a central human form. He calls himself the Black Plague and says he's here to get revenge on the school since he was a former student wannabe and they wouldn't let him in the place. He begins to rip the shit out of everything in sight.

Admittedly, I'm rather amused by seeing all the other pretty heroes shrieking in terror, since they haven't bothered a damn to develop their powers more than to show off. That, and part of me wants to see the school destroyed. But suddenly I find myself pinned under a huge chunk of dirt. In the process of destroying the lawn, the Black Plague has hit me with this enormous divot. It hurts like hell and now I'm pissed. I gotta stop this guy before he hurts someone else. Gathering all my strength, I manage to grow another me straight through the dirt and then dig myself out from there. (Not surprisingly, no one is helping me. Just standing and staring.) I then generate as many of me as I can. To my delight, I finally reach six! Then I go to town on the Plague, pummeling anything that resembles a body part in him. I'm not a very good fighter, but luckily for me, the Plague is strong, but rather a pussy when it comes to pain. I get the best of him pretty quick and he's carted away by the authorities.

And since all this got on about eighty gazillion news cameras, I get famous for fifteen minutes. There's lots of TV interviews, lots of people trying to get me to pose with cans of soda, lots of sudden money (not bad!) and lots of people trying to make me out as the same kind of person as most of the other heroes. (Funny that no one mentions how they just stood and watched and did nothing!) Thankfully, the other guys at the school aren't jealous of me like I'd worried. They all over-congratulate me to the point of me getting damn sick of it. The girls, however, do crowd around me and ask me to tell my story over and over.

A few months after my fame has worn off, another classmate has managed to save the day and now he's the center of attention. Luckily, he's also a pretty good friend of mine. They have a big assembly-type thing for him in the school's auditorium. Apparently, he saved a really rich guy, and he's being given two hundred thou as a reward. Nice moolah.

In the middle of the party afterwards, another me comes up to report that we've finished our assignment. As per our hero training, we all get assigned fairly simple crimes around the city to try our hand at solving. Mine was a missing person report. Much to my dismay, I get told by my other half that the guy had apparently just gotten really drunk and fell asleep on some train tracks. When he assimilates back into me, I get all the memories he's accumulated. And the sight of a guy with his head split in two is not a nice one. Eeeeugh. Not the most wonderful end to an assignment, but at least I did find the guy.

As everyone's still celebrating my friend's heroic triumph, he tells me that he's going to give half the money to charity right then and there. I tell him that's pretty cool. He knows I do card tricks pretty well and tells me that I should do a trick where a bunch of money suddenly appears in the deck after I find his card. I say that's a good idea and agree to do it. Big freakin' mistake.

A crowd gathers around and I start the trick. I fan the cards, have him choose, nearly drop the deck, get accused of looking at the card before hand, and when he puts it back in, I know right away I've lost it. I fumble around like an idiot, dropping cards all over. Why oh why didn't I just have another me standing at the back that could have told me what the card was?!? The crowd is not laughing or even slightly amused. Nobody likes a bad card trick.

I whisper to my friend to just find his card and put it on top. He says okay, since he knows I've fucked up and doesn't want me embarrassed further. I 'instruct' him in a loud voice to choose a card out of the pack at random and put it on top. He does and hands it back to me. Immediately, the deck slips in my hands and the top six cards fall right on the floor. I have no idea which one was his. I'm forced to do the one thing a card magician never, ever wants to do; admit he can't find a card. The audience looks at me with disdain. In a futile attempt to swing things back to my friend, I shout out that he's gonna give a hundred thou to charity. My friend takes this time to inform me that he'd kinda changed his mind about that just then. Boy am I just digging myself in deeper today.

Hoping on salvaging some of the day, I go over to this one girl who may be the school's only female outcast. She looks and acts a bit like a teenage Janeane Garafalo She's got some really spooky psychic powers and can predict the future, but only through automatic writing (which to me looks just like a page full of doodles, but I don't say so because she's never been wrong yet.). She's at her desk looking dark and mysterious as usual. I ask her if she and I might get together sometime. She asks me what my astrological sign is. Before I can answer she says 'capricorn', (which is right) and then proceeds to tell me exactly why our signs are completely wrong for each other and it'd never work. It makes me feel worse somehow that it's not a blow-off. She honestly believes everything she's saying.

I'm walking back to the dorm when I accidentally peek in the wrong door. A class is in session, the cat girls and the mouth boys; there's three slinky, sexy-kinda female superheroes and three guys whose superpowers revolve around their mouth (one can scream real loud, one can turn his words into reality...) so they've been paired up. This one girl in a vaguely medieval-lookin' tight fitting costume thing bumps past me. She looks at me as if I'm a worm. I say, earnestly, "Oh my god! What a great costume!" honestly admiring how well and detailed it's made. It takes me only a second to realize how faggy that sounded.

I slink out of the room, embarrassed as usual, and make my way back to the dorm. Will I ever adjust to this mess?

*****

-Mouse Hotel

I've imagined seeing movies before, but never one this fully realized and detailed. Sucks that I'd forgotten a good deal of it even before I woke up.

Pixar has come out with a new computer animated movie with a new technique that looks like cel animation, but is completely three-D. The look uses the same pastel colors as Monsters Inc, and creates a beautiful painted look for the backgrounds. I'm not sure if I want to see it at first, but then I catch it at Cinemark and am really glad I did.

The plot is very hazy, but the characters are fairly vivid. The action takes place in a huge Manhattan skyrise hotel. Same hidden animal society concept as CDRR & the Rescuers. A brown-furred young male mouse and a group of his friends work there doing something or other. He is outgoing and energetic, but also easily defeated-feeling. One day a young white-furred young lady mouse shows up. She is self-assured, adventurous and kind. He falls in love immediately and the main plot is basically him first trying to work up the nerve to get to know her and then to let her know how he feels and then to keep her from leaving the hotel, as she'd originally planned. There are some other characters as well, including a country-raised pacifist cat who steadfastly refuses to chase & catch mice, plus one of the brown mouse's friends; a large gruff grey mouse who is extremely scruffy but good-hearted and who keeps it a deeply hidden secret that he's in love with a diminutive, shy little cockroach girl who's also living in the hotel. Pretty much everything in here is inspired by other movies I'd seen, including American Tail, a concept for an upcoming Pixar flick, and most heavily; Rescuers Down Under

Interestingly enough, I remember it completely as a movie, of seeing it and then, incredibly, waking up (still in the dream) and being really confused through dinner trying to remember all the details of it (which did then happen as soon as I really DID wake up!).


*****


-The Little House I Used To Live In

This one feels just like a Stephen King novel. Even felt that long.

A boy has to move after his father dies. He and his mother go to this smallish white-painted house out in the country, with a huge and incredible front yard. Lots of gorgeously colorful wildflowers, even a little pond. A dreamscape. The kid, his mom (perhaps an aunt or uncle) and their Max Von Sydow-like grandpa (who he comes to for guidance) all gradually slip into a pleasant new life. He even meets a new friend who soon becomes a best friend (they like to pretend they're various animals, romping through the yard).

However, he secretly hates the move and even more so the house, because they remind him of his father's death. Gradually, strange things begin to happen. More and more, terrible, terrifying accidents are happening to the boy. He is chased by blue-eyed silver bugs with excruciating stings. He falls into a mud pit and comes out covered in thousands of tiny green grubs. He gradually figures out the house is trying to hurt him. He tries to tell everyone else, but they ignore him. He spends the rest of his childhood terrified.

Years pass. His best friend goes to war and is shot. His mother dies too. Finally, he's a bitter, depressed middle-aged man and he realizes to get any closure to his life, he must confront the house. He goes to it, and finds that it looks the same as ever, even though no one's lived there for decades. He crosses the garden through sheer luck, despite all the things the house throws at him. He finally makes it into the white stone stairwell, into the house, but then realizes it's melting! It's actually getting smaller around him, trying to trap him in! He tries to leap out through a window, but it seals before he can. His last chance is another hole, but he can only get his arm out. Just as he feels the stone about to crush his body, he figures everything out. It's not the house's fault. It can respond to the people inside it, and his first reaction was to hate it. His hateful feelings hurt it, almost like a physical attack. It tried to drive him away. The longer he stayed, the more he hated it, the more the house tried to defend itself. All this time, it had been more afraid of him. He gasps out "I'm sorry." and immediately, he is released. The house pulls him backwards away from it, through the garden, and he sees an amazing assortment of human animals, still like statues, all of them with his and his friend's faces, showing him all the happy memories he could have had...

A powerful one for sure. Visually stunning. Also I think it had an understory about the boy never getting over his father's death, and getting angry about it rather than accepting it.


*****


-Stay Out Of The Daylight

Yay! Another X Files Dream!

Scully is at a very prestigious college for artists and musicians, watching a friend's son graduate. The college was built around the ruins of a very, very old cathedral that was nearly destroyed during a war. The graduation ceremony takes place in the central room of the cathedral, the front wall made mostly of an enormous and complex stained glass design. (Throughout the dream, I'm following Scully, but she isn't aware of me. Like I'm watching an episode while inside of it.)

After the graduation is over, the students mill around and talk. One girl, a plain-ish small-framed blonde, is at the back of the room, which has been turned into a theater stage. She's center stage, looking at the stained glass, just as the sun is setting. She starts to feel terrified as the sunlight through the glass takes on an unearthly hellish quality. Soon, a horrifying demonic face is revealed. It's eyes burn into her soul. She begins to scream and scream. The other remaining students are in a panic, trying to figure out what's wrong.

By the time Scully gets there, the girl is lying dead on the stage floor, eyes wide in terror. Scully had no idea what's happened. Another student closes the curtains on the stage out of respect. As soon as the heavy curtains have blocked out the sunlight, the 'dead' girl starts to come around! Scully's amazed as she sits up, looking dizzy and sick. The curtains are opened again, and she immediately begins to scream and get weaker again. Scully at first thinks it's a sudden attack of sunlight allergy, but when she looks at the stained glass, she sees the evil face as well. She immediately snatches up the girl and runs away with her, desperately trying to find some place in the college with no windows.

They make it into a bathroom and the girl starts to get better again. Scully calls Mulder's cell and he starts frantically searching every book and database he can. Eventually he finds something about a demon that can try to kill a person's soul through sunlight. He says that she's been infected with it now, and that now all sunlight will be fatal to her.

Scully and the girl make the decision to get her out of the area (California) immediately. She and the girl manage to get on a plane to Alaska, which is at a time of perpetual night. If she can stay there long enough, the demon's influence will wear off completely. That's all I can remember.


*****


-Like Kurosawa I Make Mad Films

This has to be one of the longest and most epic dreams I've yet had. Quite fitting, given the subject matter. It had a definite storyline, but it was told in bits and pieces amongst other things and out of sequence. I'll try to make as much sense of it as I can.

I have been trapped, for as long as I can remember, in some evil genius' ongoing psychological-temporal experiment. Somehow, he is able to project me into a movie from a certain time period, usually historical epics, and I am forced to become one of the characters and live out the entire span of the movie, which is usually months if not years. And I experience every day of it.

Stranger still is that I encounter the same woman in every trip, and am sure she's part of the experiment as well, yet she can never remember me from one experience to the next. So far, we have met and fallen in love eight separate times.

Several times I have managed to escape from my captors. I've been able to find out who she is in reality and even made it to her house before. It didn't surprise me that she didn't believe a word of what I said. Yet she seemed curious the first time, and slightly more accepting of my story each time afterward. I've been able to escape and see her enough times that I think it's become a part of the experiment as well. Her motions are the same every time. As soon as she goes into her bedroom to sleep, my captor bursts in and captures me again. He has an Oddjob-like henchman whose strength is incredible. He can restrain me completely just be grabbing me around the chest.

I black out. It's time to enter another movie. I hear the evil genius' smooth, sadistic voice in my ear as he explains where I'll be going this time (he never lets me know who I'll be ahead of time). We appear to be floating over the heads of theater patrons as they enter a very fancy art-house theater. I see a poster for an old Kurosawa pic, set in feudal China. The woman in the poster looks much like the woman I keep encountering, and I suspect this means I'll be playing the Toshiro Mifune role in this pic. Too bad I haven't seen it already.

I open my eyes. I'm in a small, neatly run village near a beautiful wooded countryside. The village looks slightly ramshackle, not from oldness, but due to being set up recently, and in haste. All around me Japanese villagers are going about their work, all with a quiet poise and dignity.

I am a stranger here, but am treated as a guest. Either they're all speaking English, or I'm speaking Japanese and not realizing it. Either way, I soon learn that these people have all been forced from their home province by a much more powerful clan. Their emperor and his two princesses are living in their closest approximation of a palace nearby. I decide to visit them, to pay my respects and see what else is going on.

As soon as I arrive there, I am greeted by princess number two. (It's the woman again, I was right) Even though she's older, she is not the one who is destined to rule. That would be her younger sister.

After taking me aside to a secluded cabin, she asks if she can entrust me with a deep secret. I tell her yes. She confides in me that she is actually her younger sister. That she is the one destined to rule, but she took over her sister's place because her sister had gone off to escape her life and elope with one of the commoners. She shows me a portrait of the younger princess and tells me that that is what she really looks like. I cringe a bit. The younger princess' head is completely shaved, due to ritual custom. Also, her teeth are quite bad. I can't believe this girl is the same one I'm sitting across from. They look nothing alike.

The princess tells me that she has long practiced an ancient art of changing a person's appearance so completely that no one could tell the difference. She asks me then if I will do her a great favor. I figure, why not? I agree, but then realize maybe I spoke too soon when she asks me to become the younger princess! She says she can change my looks so I'll seem to everyone else exactly like her. I'm not sure I want to look like that, but I want to help her, so I agree. I'm not sure if it's magic or makeup, but several hours later, I do look exactly like the younger princess.

So as it stands, the older princess has run away, the younger has taken her place, and I have taken _her_ place!

I soon learn that power does indeed come with a price. In this case, I find that the young princess' role could easily be played by a life-size doll instead. All she's ever expected, or allowed, to do is sit and look perfect and be adored by the people. The real princess gives me lessons on how to act and what to do, and it basically boils down to 'be quiet and be still'. I'm shuffled around from royal function to royal function, treated like a golden calf.

I'm surprised to see how the other princess is treated. Even though she is a princess, she's treated like she's barely there at all. Our 'father' trots me out like a trophy, and treats her like my servant! He's not really a bad person though. Just so wrapped up in tradition that he chooses not to think for himself.

During this time, in the rare moments I have to myself, I and the princess get to know one another and get fairly close. It hurts in a way to fall in love with her again, since I know it'll end sometime soon, and she won't remember.

This charade goes on for months. Finally, I come out and ask the princess how long I'm going to have to play this part (interesting that I'm playing a role-within-a-role here). She blushes, and 'umm's for a bit before admitting that it could be for the rest of my life. I am more than a bit shocked. She'd always acted like this would be temporary. I ask her to tell me why and she says she lied about the other princess. She didn't just elope with the boy. They knew that they would never be able to run far enough to escape her former life, so they decided to die together. They both drowned themselves in the river just hours before I first showed up at their camp. I am more than shocked at the news. I don't speak to her for a few days, but eventually I forgive her.

Not long after that however, our little village is attacked by the same clan that drove us out before. They destroy most of the village. We know we can't rebuild. It would take too long, and now our enemies know where we are. The emperor makes the hard decision to move everyone across the land to join some distant relation's city. He doesn't like accepting charity, but he knows his relative will take them in, and he has no other choice.

Everyone in the village packs up and leaves. The chain of people, horses and wagons spreads over the long, flat roads ahead of us. The forest recedes into flat, grassy country. It's very beautiful, but the trip is long, boring and hard nonetheless.

Eventually, after a week or so, we reach our destination. The ruler of the small city-state is overjoyed to see us and heartily welcomes us all. He is very round and dressed in gaudy red robes with an enormous, spangled hat. (He also has a wavery german-accented voice, oddly enough) He seems most overjoyed to see me, and wraps 'the young princess' in a huge uncomfortable hug.

We all attend this long important ceremony that afternoon. The sun is at my back, baking me. I sit at the very front, everyone else from both cities behind me. The princess is on my left, and this city's ruler's son is to my right. I'm trying to sit still and quiet all through everything, and he keeps bugging me with annoying questions. I keep trying to shush him because I don't want either of us to get in trouble.

Partway through the ceremony, someone finally notices the absence of the boy the other princess drowned herself with. They call out his name, and it's mine! I sit uncomfortably, wondering if I'd been put in the wrong role in this movie.

That's all I can vividly remember of that life, but I know it went on well after that.

I wake up one morning and everything is gone. I'm back in my regular body, in a very modern, if dirty, building with grey metal walls. The movie is over and I'm back in reality.

I search everywhere for a way out, and finally find an opening that's a bit too obvious. I crawl in and slide down anyway, only to land on a restraining table where a young bespectacled henchman of my captor attempts to lash me down. I am up off the table in seconds, which startles the hell out of him. He asks how I did it, and I say 'you do this enough times, you learn from it'.

My captor enters. Up til now I haven't seen him clearly. He's portly like Orson Welles, in an expensive-looking robe, with slicked back black hair and a Riker beard. Very stereotypical-villain. He tells me we'll be doing things a little differently now. Oddjob grabs me and drags me out to a car. I am taken directly to the woman's house! I am introduced to her and try to get her to remember me yet again. She seems very nearly on the verge this time. I hope I'm getting closer. It seems to me that if I can ever get her to remember me right off the bat, the experiment will be over and we'll both finally be free.

The experiment goes on. I am forced through several more films. The only one I remember is a cop movie about a criminal mastermind who seems to have some kind of supernatural aura ('the wind' it's called) around him that keeps anyone from interfering with his crimes. The part I remember was of being a cop on the force assigned to bring him in. We've had dozens of encounters with him, all failures. This time, we know he plans to assassinate a rival in plain sight in a crowded restaurant. We have our guys all over the place, in plain sight as well, but he seems only amused by this. We're watching him like a platoon of hawks. Then out of nowhere, our lieutenant, who'd worked the hardest to bring him in, suddenly changes completely. He stands up and starts ranting like a drunkard about the assassination target. 'The wind' seems to have struck again. The lieut. whips out his gun and starts waving it around. Total panic. As the screaming patrons flee, the crook shoots his mark and gets away. Yet another failure.

Yet more experiments go on. The woman still does not recognize me.

Then, something totally unexpected happens. I find out the movie I'm about to enter this time is the same Kurosawa one about the two princesses I'd lived before! Repeating a film like this has never happened before. At first, I resist with all my might. I don't want to have to endure becoming the princess and living that life again. However, my struggles are useless. I wake up in exactly the same place I had awoke before.

However, this time I notice something right away that I never could have noticed the first time. Just at the edge of my vision, the real older princess is walking away from the camp, hand in hand with her lover! They're about to drown themselves! I have only seconds to act. I tear across the road towards them. People shout in confusion as I rush by them. The princess sees me and she and her lover take one look at one another and leap off the path into the river below! I force myself to my top speed, and jump into the river after them. I can't see them at first, the water is muddy. Then I notice two forms sinking to the bottom. I black out.

When I awake, I've apparently succeeded in changing fate. The princess and her lover are alive, I'd rescued them and passed out immediately after.

Needless to say, this has caused quite a bit of confusion. The emperor is glad I saved his daughter's life, but is suspicious of me anyway. He wants to know how I knew what they'd planned. I figure everything is messed up anyway, so I decide to tell them everything about the experiment, the first time I'd ever done so. I tell them all about what happened the first time, causing more than a few gasps. I tell them their village will be attacked in a few months, and they should start making plans to defend themselves immediately. Thankfully, I've proved I've been here before enough that they believe me. I hope that I can convince the emperor to bless his daughter's love, and to treat her better, and to give the younger princess more freedom. I hope this may somehow make the woman remember me this time.

I'll never know, because I wake up then.


*****


-The Matrix 2: Matrix Uploaded

[Author Note: this dream was written before the third movie came out, when I still had reason to believe it'd be good. Also, Mahesh is the name of my best friend IRL.]

Holy shit!!! I dreamed an entire Matrix sequel!

This one was super-real. Even at its weirdest, I completely believed it was all real. Basically, it starts with me and Mahesh all excited. We've apparently recently seen The Matrix Revolutions and now have a chance to see all three again in one monstah movie round. Apparently, a lot of other video stores now have a service where you can go in a back room and have your own rented mini theater for yourself and a few friends. Not like a real movie theater of course, but better than just watching it on TV. There's a big wraparound flat tv that sorta hangs above the audience a little bit so if you lean back in your chair it's a bit above eye level and creates a small but nice effect similar to that of an Imax. We've rented the place long enough to see the three Matrix films, and this sets things in motion.

"Say, do you remember the first Matrix sequel?" I ask Mahesh.

He momentarily doesn't know what I'm talking about.

"There's actually four movies, remember? That one with Halle Berry in it? That was at the dollar theater for a long time?" Finally, he gets it.

After waking up and thinking about it rationally, this would either be impossible filmmaking, or this is some alternate future where technology had advanced a decade or so. But essentially, The Wachowskis had an idea for a new concept in movies; the almost-sequel. Essentially, once the studio heads realized 'The Matrix' had made a bunch of money, they greenlighted a smaller movie to be made that was a serviceable film in and of itself, but not nearly as impressive as the sequel would be. It would incorporate a lot of computer animation interacting with real actors, and other tricksy movie things that they'd be playing with to see how well they'd work in a future movie. It would also cost a trifle compared to the other movies. Initially it would only be released online and then on DVD. Its theatrical release would be dependent wholly on how well it was doing. It ended up doing nicely and getting a limited release at smaller theaters, where it stayed a long time and I got to see it. On the whole, the movie really is very experimental and 'let's do this as we go along and see what the hell happens'. There's also an unspoken deal with the fans of the film; 'We'll give you a little sequel if you promise not to take it seriously if it sucks.' Also, the movie's pretty short. Just a little above an hour.

(I think this whole concept was inspired by me telling Mahesh about the Animatrix and "Final Flight Of The Osiris", and by me finding out about "The Matrix Revisited"; the documentary/making-of/self-pat-on-the-back little thing they did shortly after the Matrix came out. I saw the title and went 'What, they made another movie and no one told me!?')

"Matrix 2: The Matrix Uploaded" takes place very shortly after the events in the first one. Like, a few days. It opens with a title roll in metallic purple tint instead of the usual neon green. The opening scene is nifty. We start with a helicopter shot of Neo within the Matrix, standing on top of a tallish building shaped like a squat symmetrical capital 'Y'. He reaches out with his new powers and grabs the helicopter with his mind. He grabs it by a tow cable and we drop into bullet-time as he starts to use the helicopter like a giant wrecking ball, actually smashing it into the side of the building, using it's momentum like a hammer thrower. For some reason, it's important to the real world that this building be destroyed, and Neo is at work. Through all this he doesn't speak or emote much. Then time goes funny and we watch things happen backwards in slo-mo a bit. The scene changes to a basic-looking office floor with cubicles and all. Thomas Anderson, in the days before being freed by Morpheus, is sitting at his desk, which is by the window, plugging away at his computer. People around him start to scream. He looks up out the window to see the helicopter that Neo wields coming straight at his window. He freezes deer-in-the-headlights like and we see the copter come crashing in, reflected in an extreme close-up of his eye.

Over this opening, Keanu does a voice over: "What if reality wasn't real? What if you found out you could change anything you wanted within the Matrix? What if you could destroy anything in it? How would you use that power?" He says it again, now like it's not rhetorical, and is really asking us for advice. "How would you use that power?"

Neo wakes up in The Ark on the Nebbuchanezzar. Morpheus is there to explain that what he was in is a program they just designed to teach him one simple thing; the people in the Matrix are still people. It couldn't hurt to think of them and try really hard not to kill them.

Morpheus explains that Neo's training was rushed, that he was put into action too soon, and Morpheus apologizes for not telling him sooner. Neo forgives him. Morph' explains that most ship crews from Zion are all rigorously trained before being put in a combat situation. Upload programs are one thing, but actual instruction makes a difference. He says he's set it up where Neo will train with Zion's training programs and instructors. (Sort of a Matrix-style Starfleet Academy, but shorter time-wise) Neo is excited to actually see Zion, but Morpheus tells him that's not the case. He says he'll do his training from the uplink chair. He explains how Zion has developed ways to transfer what a body learns inside the Matrix to his real body, in real time. Essentially, he'll bulk up and get in shape in his mind while his body mirrors everything in the chair. Long distance exercise!

Neo will train inside Zion's own 'Ark'; meaning their own secure 'mini-matrix' where they can alter reality like the Matrix, but it's free of Agents. It can be safely accessed from anywhere in the real world and is much easier to leave quickly than the real matrix (no phonebooths necessary).

I lose a lot of details here. Essentially, most of the film is Neo's training in Zion's 'dojo'. Where we learn lots of things about the Matrix, the real world, and other details they couldn't get in-depth into in the other films. Now we see why this is a limited release thing. Only the real big fans will give a shit since there's less action, less flashy special effects, less original cast and much more story and dialogue. (Note; Trinity is conspicuous in her absence from the dream. I thought for sure she would've shown up.)

The first day (time is relative inside) in training, Neo is mostly shown around so he'll get the basic gist of things. Kind of like orientation. He learns that most of the programs have the environment set at real world levels, meaning he won't be able to bend rules like in the matrix. He'll have to use his own strength and speed. Also, there are safety controls in place so if you died in one of these programs, you wouldn't die in the uplink chair. I remember Neo walking along a huge concourse with a virtual Morpheus explaining things to him. Basically, it's a guide/information program that can take on the holographic image of an actual person. The main hub of the training academy is a round room with doors leading everywhere else in the 'building'. It has an enormous ceiling that tapers to a point at the top, reminiscent of cathedral architecture, and making the room the shape of one gigantic-ass bullet.

(Another interesting thing I noticed was that instead of the usual blue or green tint, the training place and its programs have a light yellow tint, like sunlight through a greenhouse.)

One of his new instructors is Halle Berry. This is weird: she's in the same character, Jynx, as that James Bond movie, though in this film instead. Which, hey, makes sense. Wouldn't you want Halle teaching combat training to you? She's wearing a dark maroon one-piece rubber jumpsuit (just like the ones in "The Cell", but they look better on her) I don't remember quite what class she was teaching, but it was in a room like one of those half-cylinder military airplane hangars, but so damn big you could fit a few hundred thousand jets in it. It's very dim inside, most of the light is centered like a spotlight on whoever's inside. Makes it easier to find them if you're at opposite ends of the gigantic room. Neo awakes in the very center and finds the gravity's way up. He crashes to the floor. He looks up to see Jynx coming towards him, hips swaying, as if the heightened gravity doesn't affect her. Near as I can tell, the class is about training in different gravity; like in DragonBall Z, you train in thicker gravity so that when you switch back to normal, your strength and speed increase. Jynx is a patient teacher with a sunny personality that gently urges Neo on to do better. I also seem to have a fleeting image of Neo, much later in training, running around the room fast enough that he shoots up the walls like Trinity in the beginning of the first film.

Another program starts in a rather awful way. Two dudes carry a stretcher between them into this little attic apartment where a middle-aged black woman stands impassive, cooking some type of stew on a stove. On the stretcher is a gruesomely mangled and burnt body which they identify as Neo! The lady, who is probably S. Epatha Merkleson (from Law & Order) with her hair up in a broccoli 'fro, seems totally unconcerned. Even when they set the body down right next to where she's cooking! They leave and all she does is go about her business, but keeping an eye on the body as well. Suddenly, it begins to shudder violently. She stands over it, now obviously *very* interested. In an instant, the body twists and changes and becomes Neo, fully healed and in his usual in-the-matrix garb (trenchcoat, sunglasses). Without thinking, he reacts blindly, and accidentally karate chops the woman in the throat. Realizing what he's done, he calls out loud for his operator to give him some quick medical training (like Trinity learning to fly the helicopter). The woman (I'm just gonna call her Epatha) lays on the floor, eyes wide, obviously gasping for breath like a fish out of water. Neo sticks one finger down her throat and puts his other hand to the side of her neck. With a rather unpleasant sudden jerk, he snaps her throat back into place. She adjusts her jaw. "Thanks for saving my life, but you should've washed that finger first," she says.

It turns out this is a healing program. It operates like the matrix does. Basically, if you get injured in the matrix, and you know for sure it couldn't have happened in the real world, like if a limb gets blown off, if you concentrate enough you can 'heal' yourself. Put in computer terms, you reset your perception of yourself in the matrix. The first day of this program starts with the subject just barely alive with a mangled body and no instructions as to what to do, to see if they can figure out on their own what to do and if they can effect any change. Epatha's very impressed. Hardly anyone gets anywhere at all the first day and no one's ever spontaneously healed like that. Neo is very obviously the One.

Another program Neo encounters is one he's not in, but gets a chance to watch. Virtual Morpheus and he are walking and a bunch of heavily armed swat-team-lookin' guys go past. Neo asks who they are. Morph' says maybe they should take a look. They are members of Zion's most elite soldiers. The toughest buncha badasses the humans have. Their training programs are insane. What they're going through today is sort of like Capture the Flag mixed with Laser Tag in hell. They are in a vast room that is filled partway with water so that it comes up to just below the chins of most of the soldiers. The water slows their movements and response time and makes it much more difficult to hide, since there is absolutely nothing obstructing anyone's view of anyone else. The only way to hide is to go under, and only then as long as you can hold your breath. There are also labyrinth-like walls all over the room just below water level to hinder movement further. Virtual Morpheus explains that the rules are very simple; two teams, the object is to rescue three virtual team members being held by the opposing team. Victory is achieved only when all three virtual team members are rescued and every other member of the enemy team is killed. Neo is amazed anyone can compete under these conditions. But they go at it fiercely. (Lotsa neat in-and-out-of water shots here. The action is quick, precise and intense. Lotsa bullets splashing through the water. The soldiers vanish into pixels when they're shot.) Neo is intrigued. Morph' tells him he can try out for the elite forces if he chooses. Neo gives it some thought.

Unfortunately, if I have any more of the film from the dream, I've forgotten it. Shit. It's certainly an interesting idea. Be interesting to see Neo in a virtual Agent training program. (He would kick some ass.) Why do so many of my dreams have such oddly disappointing endings?

Oh well. At least I got to see Halle Berry in a rubber outfit.


*****


-Pre-kira

I can't believe it! I dreamed a prequel to Akira! And it ain't a bad story, either.

So it starts off several years previous in my life. I've come across a bunch of videos I'd filled a long time ago with things off TV. I find a tape that has Akira on it that I'd taped off the Sci Fi channel. I watch a bit of it at the beginning and get hooked and decide to see the whole thing over again.

Oddly enough, it's not the movie I know, but a wholly different storyline and characters. The animation style is very different, too. The characters are rendered in detail, but lots of things in the background are reduced to bare essentials of color and shape, which interestingly give them a hyper-realistic feel. The colors are vivid and clashing in a slightly queasy way, which is done on purpose to convey a feel for the city. Lots of dark warm grey and bright artificial magenta and light green.

I'm fairly sure this all happens before the original Akira project. Tokyo is a sprawling, pulsing, fattened city, pumped full of corruption and crime. The story focuses on a small gang, kind of like Kaneda's, but they're more like nerds. They don't go in for street violence, they prefer computer crime, but they won't shy from a fight if one's brought. They're tight knit, like a family of brothers.

Their leader has gotten a tip from an anonymous source that he's got a job for the gang and is willing to pay an absolutely insane amount of money for it. The leader knows that even split a bunch of ways, it's enough to set all of them for a good long time. The leader finds out that the job involves sneaking into space to destroy a satellite. No info is given on why the guy wants the satellite destroyed, but the leader has a good guess that it's to hinder the country's military, which has seriously gotten out of control and turned most of Japan into an unofficial police state.

The gang leader manages to convince his boys to do the job. Since it's going to take a lot of manpower to pull off, the leader asks his informant (hereafter referred to as 'the insider') if they can bring in some trusted friends. Essentially, some guys bring their girlfriends along, and the leader rounds up an expert hacker friend who's both a genius and a bit of a porn connoisseur named Boomer.

The beginning of the job will involve sabotaging and stealing one of several airships that patrol Tokyo's skies. A word on these; these are giant autonomous robots that hover above the city in a constant pattern to keep anyone from flying through their airspace - military paranoia is high. The airships have enough intelligence to perform search-and-destroy missions, but are not sentient in any way. (It's hard to describe how they look. My best try would be to cross Bucky O'Hare's ship with an original Galvatron missing his laser lightbulb thing, all colored grey, purple and red.)

With one of these, the nerd gang can get into space. The airships can get through the atmosphere, but they're not strictly made for it, so there's more than a little risk there. It's also a good way to get into space in a way no one would expect. The insider arranges a meeting with the gang to give them a bunch of supplies they'll need to make the airship more liveable. At the meeting, which is behind a derelict supermarket, the gang is waiting and this van with some sort of happy cartoony company logo on it pulls up abruptly and some black-clad government-looking guys leap out. For a second, the gang worries they've been set up, but the driver emerges and it's the insider. He admits to being within the military and wanting to see it brought down a notch. The black-clad guys are just there to unload the stuff for the trip.

Among the packages is a large bag made of metallic blue foil. It's about the size of a large dog and both heavy and floppy. The insider tells the leader that this is part of a wholly different project. If the gang can take this with them and simply leave it on the satellite to be blown up, he'll pay them even more. The insider warns though that it is not to be opened, not under any circumstances. This makes them worry a bit about what the hell it is, but they agree nonetheless. It's easy money.

They have one shot to board the airship. Each night, just once, four airships dock for daily maintenance and four others are deployed. The gang lies in wait for one to dock, then immediately spring on it like bugs on a candy bar.

The leader and Boomer go right to work fiddling with some wiring panels on the outside of the airship's turret. The rest of the gang and company break into an access hatch and climb aboard. At one point, Boomer gets a little fed up with trying to hack the system and simply bashes the circuitboard with a hammer. The front of the ship is like a head that can swivel in various directions to aim better at targets, and it goes wild for a few seconds, flinging those inside about the cabin. They ask if anyone was screwing with the 'neck' circuits and Boomer looks sheepish.

Just before disembarking, the leader performs a test on his crew to see if they are 'mature' enough for the mission. He shows them some pages from a truly bizarre furry-themed porn mag to see how much they cringe. Except for the girls, the gang all performs admirably. The leader makes a joke about Boomer being especially interested in the magazine.

The gang finally gets the airship off the ground and takes off for space. They make it through the atmosphere, but barely. After searching for a while they see the satellite, which is huge, and they dock with it.

To celebrate the first part of their task, they sit down to a hearty meal. Much to their horror, they find that the food packed for their trip is well beyond spoiled. It's covered in mold and dead bugs. It's so disgusting they toss it out the airlock. Well, no food. They'll just have to get this job done and get home as soon as they can.

Unfortunately though, things are getting worse by the second. First, they find that the tools they were given to crash the satellite are completely useless. Then one of the guys discovers that the airship's been damaged during the trip and there is no way it could make it back through the atmosphere a second time without exploding. It looks like our heroes are stuck in space with no food and no way to get home.

Realizing they're fucked, they panic a bit. Finally, the leader does the only thing he can think of, he calls the insider on a videophone inside the airship. They're shocked that he doesn't seem at all surprised by their situation. To their horror, he laughs at them! He tells them he'd planned this all along to get rid of them for whatever reason. The gang are aghast. No help is coming. They're doomed.

Being teenagers, they manage to deal with it admirably at first, getting all philosophical about it. Then the hunger begins to really set in and things start getting crazy. Eventually, one of them remembers the super secret package they were supposed to destroy. They manage to get the super strong plastic open and find what they least expected inside; meat! A huge slab of it!

Hunger mad, they don't even bother thinking about why there's meat in the package, they go right for it, cook it haphazardly and chow down. It's only afterward that they really reflect on what in hell they just ate.

Soon afterward, weird things do happen to them, but not at all what they expected. At random times, they seem to be able to give little 'pushes' with their minds. Tiny sparks of telepathic ability seem to be popping up in them. Needless to say, they are all seriously confused by this.

Days later, the videophone rings. It's the insider. He looks disturbingly smug. He tells them that everything up till now was planned. He's not a traitor to the government, he's working with them. Government scientists discovered something or other that seems to make psionic ability appear in otherwise normal people. They wanted to test a group that didn't know they were being tested, and they knew the gang would never consent to being treated like guinea pigs. So they constructed a scenario that would work with their rebellious tendencies, and everything fell right into place. They knew the gang wouldn't rip open the secret package and eat the meat unless they were desperate enough to think it was their only option. He mentions also that the tainted meat also seems to have the side effect of killing their previous test subjects. And that's where the meat came from.

The gang is shocked and more than that, outraged. The insider tells them that they'll continue to be monitored for a while longer and when the food runs out, they'll simply be left to die. The leader tells him he's just created something very dangerous; someone with nothing to lose. The insider scoffs and ends the call.

They do, indeed, have nothing to lose. But rather than give up, the gang becomes more resolute to beat the bastards at their own game. They were hired to crash the satellite, and decide that's just what they're going to do. The airship can't make it back through the atmosphere, but it can still fly. The decision is made to use it to ram the satellite and force it into the atmosphere. The satellite is big as a space station and has several escape pods; the gang will use them to flee the satellite once it's through the atmosphere. The problem is, whoever pilots the airship has no way to get back to the satellite. It's a suicide mission.

Boomer is already feeling shitty from the meat. He says he'll do it. They bid him a hero's farewell.

There's no reason not to go through with it right then and there. Boomer undocks the airship and the others huddle in one intensely cramped escape pod. Boomer flies a goodly distance away, then floors it. The satellite shudders and begins zooming towards Earth. As it falls into the fiery atmosphere, most of it is burned away. The gang hopes beyond hope the escape pods will survive. Boomer watches through the cockpit as he himself plunges into the atmosphere. The airship burns like a fireplace log. Boomer dies laughing as his body explodes in flames and melts.

The satellite makes it through mostly intact. They've calculated how to get it to fall fairly close to Japan, close enough that the pod would have fuel to make it home. The satellite falls toward the ocean and the escape pod is launched, headed for Tokyo. Almost immediately, it is fired on by several airships at once and blown to smithereens. The insider chuckles at this small victory as he watches the satellite fall into the ocean. It was as important as he'd said and losing it is a tremendous blow to the military. Essentially, they're jolly well screwed.

The satellite lies still at the bottom of the ocean. That is, until it launches a second escape pod, the one that actually carries our heroes. The first was just a diversion, and it worked perfectly. The gang makes it to shore under cover of night. They are free, but they know they may well soon die from the meat. They tramp through the woods and find a summer beach house, empty in the off season. It'll do for now.

Meanwhile, based on the information gathered from the tests on the gang, the scientists have discovered a better way to force psionic ability in people. Young children, specifically. And the powers they could conceivably have are infinite...

I'm not precisely sure how this ends, or about a lot of things in the story overall. I've had to make up stuff to make this come together and have had to rearrange several parts chronologically. There was other stuff I left out, including a bit where Quaid and Cohagen from Total Recall replaced two of the characters for one scene. Though all of the elements were there to discover. This tale wanted to be told.


*****


-'Collected'

This one felt like an episode of some slightly grisly 'Twilight Zone' type show, then abruptly began to feel like it was me in place of the main character.

A bunch of cars are travelling down a long road in the urban countryside. The cars' occupants are all salesmen of some sort, all arguing about some new product (something like foaming lunch meat). The camera is focusing on one particular driver, a basic guy in a suit. Suddenly, something I don't quite remember happens that smashes the guy's car just as it's going into this indentation in the road. The wrecked car is in a dip in the road so that if anyone in the other cars looked behind them, they wouldn't be able to see the wreck. This is where I started to become the role of the guy in the car. He's looking down at his legs which are twisted horribly. He's covered in blood and glass, but luckily all of his injuries are survivable.

I come to as the man in the car later. My smashed car is being towed by another car into someone's backyard. There's no grass, just dirt and assorted engine parts, all surrounded by a peeling red wood fence. I wonder why I'm not being taken to a hospital. The other car unhooks mine and just drives off. I lie there a while, wondering what the hell's going on.

Then, a woman comes over and seems very concerned about me. Sometimes I saw her as Gadget, though she wasn't, just had the same type of caring personality. She tends to me as best she can, prying my seatbelt off and lifting me out of the car. I can barely move anything but my mouth to speak. I ask her what's going on. She has a look about her like someone surviving, but barely; scarred and scared. She tells me that I've been taken by this man who likes to 'collect' other people. She says he keeps them like animals, feeding them only occasionally, mostly just getting off on the power of knowing he owns them. She says she's been here a month or so. She looks like she's been here much longer. I ask why I was taken, and she says that as near as she can tell, it's random. The man doesn't care who he owns, just so long as he owns someone.

The fence doesn't seem so high, and we're in a populated area, I ask why she hasn't escaped yet. She tells me she's too scared to. She knows the man will track her down no matter what, and that for some inexplicable reason, the residents of the neighborhood condone his sickness. Some such insanity about a man having the right to own 'property'.

She tends to my wounds the best she can. She says she knows the man won't. He'd be happy to simply watch me bleed to death. At this point, I'm more angry than scared. No sonofabitching psychopath is going to keep me like a slave. My legs aren't broken, but there's no way I can walk on them. I tell the woman (I think later I find her name is Susan) that we have to try to escape somehow. She's still too afraid.

It feels like days go by. My injuries are getting worse. There's nothing in the backyard or my car Susan can use to really help me any. I keep losing more blood. Finally, after what feels like a week, I feel like it's the end. My vision is blurry, and I'm numb all over. Susan can take it no longer. She decides to risk escaping to get me to a doctor.

The fence is so old, she breaks down a section of it. She carries me in her arms and makes off down the street. We come across a group of kids who not only refuse to help us, but seem disgusted at us for escaping. Susan is running with me along a suburban street, through a park, crying the whole time. I apparently pass out, because I don't know what happens after that.

The dream skips to several years later. Apparently we did manage to escape. Susan and I are passionate lovers. Our shared horror brought us together. We've written a book about our ordeals and our escape and are about to get it published. However, I'm appalled at the response our story has gotten. Most people are unsupportive of us, and some are openly hostile towards us! It's the same sentiment as those neighborhood kids; we were the man's property and had no right to go running off like that. The cops have never bothered to look into our story, or even pretend to be interested in catching the man. We get letters all the time about how shameful our behavior was, and how they hope the man finds us and puts us back in our place. It seems like we're alone against the world.

Our book is about to be published, and we're about to leave the country and go somewhere (not sure on the details) where we'll be safe. Susan and I are in a yellow VW beetle driving through some minor city, probably to get to an airport.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, the man's car is behind us. It's a red-wine-colored toyota. Strangely, I never actually see the man. He remains this ever-present unseen menacing figure. He swerves at us and makes us turn into a junkyard. He's hunting us, forcing us where he wants us to go. We're not sure if he wants to kill us or 'collect' us again.

We drive around in circles, cat and mouse-like for quite a while. He seems to never tire. He's trying to wear us down. But this time, I'm in good health and just as righteously angry as before. I don't think I can take him one-on-one, but I'm sure I can outsmart him and get us away.

Susan and I reach the edge of the junkyard and we ditch the car. We figure there's places we can go on foot that he can't get to by car. We climb up this big pile of trash so we can jump over the wall and get away. We're also looking around frantically for anything we can use against the man if he gets near and sees us. We plan on losing him somehow and then stealing another car to drive away in. The dream ends, and I don't know if we ever get that far.

This dream was understandably scary, especially how no one cared that Susan and I had been enslaved. It reminds me of how people tolerate hunting and trapping, then think it's shocking when an animal attacks a person when they have every right to. This dream was much deeper than my usual ones.


*****


-Sonic X2

One of the most visually gorgeous dreams I have _ever_ had! Hands down! It was obviously inspired by the upcoming Sonic X cartoon, but I was seeing the dream (mostly) through Sonic's eyes as if everything around me was really happening.

The setup is that Dr. Robotnik (Now Dr. Eggman, but I still think Robotnik sounds better) was defeated on Mobius, and decided to rethink his strategy and move on to a new planet. He packs up and moves to another inhabited planet, a very technologically advanced world with a mostly peaceful populace. (They're also a human-looking species, but it's not earth) Robotnik turns to the favorite tool for gaining power from nothing; politics. He finally realized that giant robots just aren't as effective as getting the people to love you enough to *give* you all the power and wealth you want. Essentially, the roboticizer is no longer needed to make slaves, Robotnik just shows up on TV, grinning and lying.

Robotnik is already in power over one of the largest and most advanced cities on this new planet. He's gotten himself elected mayor, and is quickly amassing the needed wealth and support to grab for an even higher position.

The opening shot of the city is probably the most detailed, beautiful, astounding thing I have ever dreamed. It's like the detail and visual style of the animated Metropolis combined with the sheer vastness of some of the scenes from Star Wars episodes one and two. The city has the same huge buildings and population of New York, but most of it is laid out horizontally. (Think NYC as designed by ancient Romans) Everything is huge and gorgeously designed, everything looks brand new. The streets stretch out for miles in every direction. The houses are laid out suburbia-like, compact and efficiently. There was a sports arena; square perimeter with a wide, circular area in the middle, colored deep coral red, it was easily four times as big as any stadium I've ever seen. Another large building, and one of the few tall ones was a town hall/library type place. Rich, dark purple-grey color, unbelievable architecture with towering columns in front. Imagine the capitol building minus the rotunda, about sixty stories tall and with all the elements exaggerated grandly.

But the star of it all is Robotnik's palace. Picture a twenty story pleasure palace, roughly cubical, with squat pyramids capping the top and bottom. Picture every story with enormous balconies encircling them. Tall, narrow cathedral-like arches around every tier. Picture it all colored in gleaming gold colors, making it look as if it's made of pure gold. Now picture _three_ of these. Picture a smaller, fourth one with royal red mixed with the gold, the smaller building shaped somewhat like an English crown.

Now picture them *flying*.

They soar over the city at amazing speeds, hovering effortlessly, the three larger buildings flanking the smaller one. They move in tight, precise formation. Their flight isn't silent, but accompanied by a low guttural engine sound. Later in the dream, it's explained that they all have artificial gravity in them so that no one inside ever even feels the movement. This would have to be, since at one point the buildings are making a tight turn and one of them actually has to *flip upside down* to complete it!!! A twenty story building making a perfectly smooth midair somersault!!!

It's time for Sonic to enter. He's finally made it to this other world, intending to make sure Robotnik doesn't take over this world like he has Mobius. While most of the planet sees Robotnik as any other celebrity and worships him accordingly, a growing section of the lower class has begun to wonder about him. Robotnik keeps up a good front, but every mask has a seam.

It's early afternoon, the sun is bright and it couldn't be a clearer, more perfect day. Sonic infiltrates one of the larger flying buildings. Each of the three is actually a luxury hotel. The decor is elegant beyond belief, combining old-world style with cutting edge technology. At least, above a certain point they are; the lower levels are where the workers of the hotel live and keep things running. There's also a small open-market type place in each where the workers buy and sell goods. The smaller crown-like building is where Robotnik actually lives. Having the other three as hotels is not only a good way to make oodles of cash, but they also act as a human shield. Who's going to attack him when he's surrounded by so many innocents? The answer: one blue hedgehog.

Sonic is inside, trying to learn as much as he can about the place. He notices a man he knows is Robotnik's head techno-guy. He's a beanpole type with a resemblance to Weird Al and a tall sproing of brown hair. Sonic tails him. The scientist goes up through various tubelike elevators in the hidden areas of the hotel. I remember vividly a bit where Sonic switches elevators so quick he's just a tiny blue blur.

Sonic follows him into a lab with all sorts of sciency doohickeys. A disturbing amount of them look like weapons, including an enormous one that looks like it would rise up out from the pyramid on top of the building.

Having seen enough to know Robotnik's up to no good again, Sonic goes up to the roof. Immediately, he's surrounded by a bunch of police. Their uniforms and gear are metallic black with blood red accents. Not far behind them is a sleek black cop 'copter that looks like it took some heavy damage to the rotor blades. Sonic wonders if someone else is fighting against Robotnik. Sonic is standing on top of an air conditioning machine (I assume that's what it is). He looks frantically around, and sees a cop car hovering just off the side of the roof.

The cruiser is really nifty. It's the same configuration as a star wars landspeeder; cockpit near the back, long, rounded hood in front, engine just behind the cockpit. The dual engines are turbine-ish, like the car in MIB. Overall, the lines of the hovercar are very curved and sleek like a newly polished black corvette stingray. There's also a hemisphere of red on the front end (as if the front was dipped gently into red paint), the doors are gull-wings, it flies silently and there's a very dangerous-looking machine gun turret coming out of the hood near the cockpit. A cop in a radiation-yellow suit hangs out the side of the passenger door, holding another scary weapon.

Sonic realizes he just might be able to jump from where he is onto the hood. He risks it. This part, I truly felt like I was leaping off a twenty story building floating hundreds of feet in the air. I could see all the way down the side of the building to the tiny buildings below. I could feel the wind around me. Sonic of course makes it to the cop car. Unfortunately, I don't know what happened next, except that he did manage to make a clean getaway.

Again, like all my most interesting dreams, this one cuts off at a suspenseful part. Looking back, this dream had elements and 'feels' from a lot of things. The hotel's lower storys reminded me of the Spirited Away. The city and Robotnik's flying buildings had the same look as Metropolis and The Fifth Element (which that cop car could have come straight out of). The action bits had the same intensity and motion as The Matrix, especially the leap off the roof.


*****


-Night Drive

I'm watching a horror movie: It's fairly late at night and a school bus driver is taking a bunch of grade-school kids home after some kind of field trip. The driver, a semi-attractive thirtyish redhead in a jean jacket, is driving the kids right to their homes, since all of them live within a small area, and also because it's late. A teenage brunette is on the bus too, sitting in the seat nearest the front. She was late getting home and asked the driver if she could bum a ride. She and the driver are nervous because a murderer is on the loose in the general area and police are still looking for him.

They're going down a narrow residential street now. It's damn near pitch black out and the bus' headlights don't seem to be doing much. Suddenly, the girl sees someone skulking around a car and asks the bus driver to back up and shine the lights on the area. The driver does a three point turn in a driveway and as soon as they look back they see that four nine-foot-tall red demons have instantly appeared! This part scared the SHIT out of me. The way they appeared literally in the blink of an eye. Two stood in the street, two others crouched on top of cars on either side of the street. Their skin was bright red, like exposed muscle, with pure white bones poking through in places. Each of them were holding some long spear-like weapon. What most creeped me out was how motionless they were, while still giving a clear indication they could move, and fast as hell, through their unblinking eyes. Everyone on the bus sees them in perfect detail, regardless of the light. Their eyes seem to stare directly at each person on the bus. Everyone's hearts skip a beat. The kids all start screaming and the girl shouts out "Reverse! Reverse!!!" The driver stomps the pedal and they burn rubber backwards as fast as they can. The driver keeps her eyes locked with the demons, sure that if she breaks the gaze for even a second, they'll all be done for. The bus gets to the end of the street onto a well-lit main road and they peel out. The driver keeps on driving all through the night, never stopping. None of them want to stop. None of them ever want to get off the bus again.

What got to me most about this dream was how the demons just let them go. In a way, saying, 'we'll come get you whenever we want to. We just want to scare you now.' Brrrrrrr.


*****


-"TIME", 1938, 88m, color/b&w

Wow! What a visual stunner! I've had some beautiful, movie-like dreams before, but never one with such a vividly real and amazingly consistent look to it!

I'm watching an old movie that has just recently been rediscovered in some dusty film vault and given the 'sprucing-up' it deserves. It is the lone film by a forgotten genius director. An epic film about the passage of time and how easily men forget history. The film took years and years to make and became such a hassle to the studio that the heads of it very nearly fired the director and canned the whole project. Finally, under stress, a final cut was pieced together and released in theaters. Audiences everywhere recoiled in confusion and gaped in amazement at the same time. They weren't ready for it (a lot like Fantasia, really). The film's story was very metaphorical, with all the characters and situations merely representing ideas. Plus, it had the most mind-blowing special effects of its time. It had some scenes in color years before that was thought possible (achieved through some extremely expensive experimental film, and some old-fashioned meticulous hand-tinting of single frames), plus a barrage of eye-boggling effects done with mirrors throughout the film, which created a signature style. Unfortunately, audiences were so dazzled and confused by these effects that they couldn't grasp the story. It flopped immediately. The studio was more than happy to burn the prints. Finally, now, a film historian found a cache of the director's personal film stock and the movie was painstakingly spliced back together with computers, the soundtrack and picture given a digital cleanup, but not tampering a hair with the color or special effects. They more than speak for themselves.

The movie starts with a very plain, nebbishy-looking man in a brown suit and hat walking along a light blue hallway of some sort (shot from the side perspective). He has glasses and a moustache and looks amazingly like Robert Crumb. As he walks, his image begins to fracture, until it seems as if several of him are walking along at once, split into strips running from the top to the bottom of the screen. A very disorienting mirror effect. The multiple refractions stop as the man (I think he was called Mr. Brown) reaches his destination; a kind of circular switch set into the wall of an octagonal blue tower with perfectly smooth sides, like crystal. This is all one continuous shot, from straight on, completely silent.

The scene cuts abruptly to Mr. Brown's reflection in the large circular 'lock'. The lock (which fills the whole screen) is four or five concentric circles with a rectangle the width of the innermost circle and the length of the first two and a half circles. Mr. Brown's image is refracted all over the place like a shattered mirror. But as his hand comes into frame and turns the rings and the rectangle of the lock, the pieces of his face stay exactly where they are and rotate in the circle! It's a jarring image. A truly nifty special effect that only looks like a split reflection. (This is one of many effects in the film that no one was ever able to figure out how the director pulled off after the movie flopped and the production secrets were lost. The director was extremely secretive.)

The circles of the lock as they turn are accompanied by a sudden sound of an immense clockwork being wound up. It's the first sound we hear, and its volume jolts you out of your seat. When Mr. Brown's image has been returned to normal, the lock is open. He turns the rectangular piece horizontal and with a loud echoing click, the screen goes pitch black, the title appears, stately white letters seemingly rising out of a fog of blackness, "TIME", and the movie can begin.

I lose a huge part of the movie's middle. I do know that it spans hundreds of years of human technological progress. The movie is asking the question of whether it is wise that our technology should progress so fast while our culture virtually stands still. In essence, our science is maturing, but we as a race are not. (This was an idea that made quite a lot of audience members uncomfortable, and some of them a little mad. They saw it as a critique, not a caution as it was intended). The science fiction and views of the future expressed here seemed radical and cynical at the time, but later proved to be frighteningly accurate (mostly in terms of future sociology; the technology was your usual giant computers and flying cars)

All over the entire planet, one humongous water and electricity system has been hollowed out under the earth, spanning miles and miles and miles of pipes and wiring. It's said the system is infallible and can keep on producing electricity and water for thousands of years.

But it doesn't. The water begins, gradually at first, to dry up. The cause is completely unknown. Scientists across continents study every aspect of the system and can find no reason for the water levels to be shrinking. Not surprisingly, the politicians decide for themselves that the only possible answer is sabotage by another country's spies. Blame is thrown around by everyone. People begin to hate and fear their neighbors.

It doesn't take long for a world war to break out. Across the world, millions of soldiers duke it out in every country. All the while there's less and less water.

The action focuses now on three likable American soldiers. One is a bit of a comedian. He uses humor to deal with the miserable life all around him. He's also not the bravest of men and the other guys have nicknamed him 'the Cowardly Soldier' (in reference to the Cowardly Lion of Oz).

Each scene we see with them takes place in the same tent. (just outside the tent, you can see a flat plain, stretching forever into the distance, where thousands and thousands of men are killing each other hand to hand. Another mirror effect, but amazingly subtle) Each scene opens with the three of them entering the tent together, talking, the camera following them as they walk around. Sometimes months pass in between scenes. The snapshots in time show us how the war changes the men. They quickly lose their joviality and become hard, haggard and mean. Their eyes sink in, their faces become scarred. The tent changes too, from a mess and recreation hall, to a battle planning station, to a makeshift hospital with dozens of wounded men moaning in cramped beds all around. It doesn't take long for one of the soldiers to lose all hope and another to become heartlessly cruel to anyone around him. (BTW, at the start of the war, the film was in light color, but as the war drags on, color becomes more and more sparse, until at the end the film is in stark film-noiresqe black and white)

All except the comedian. He becomes harder, yes, but he holds onto his sense of humor. While it makes him into a bit of a jerk, it also keeps him sane. He becomes more and more disgusted by the insanity around him and wonders why he's even fighting anymore.

The war has become a miserable gloryless slog. Hundreds die each day. Places to treat the wounded shrink smaller every minute. Hospitals are crammed with dying, wailing people. There are no graves, just heaps of bodies of men dying too fast to do anything more with them. At this time, the three soldiers do not enter the tent. The camera pans along their usual path, but all we see are endless beds full of suffering people. Finally, we come upon the 'Cowardly Soldier'. He is unconscious, barely hanging on to life. Doctors around allude to him doing something insanely courageous that saved many lives, but unfortunately his two companions are not among them. The comedian is silent. All that's left are the constant screams and the constant prayers to god to end the war and their suffering.

In the next scene, the comedian has awakened. He's watching the conditions in the hospital get worse day by day. He's griping about this to a reporter at his bedside. At first, there were two pills a day, now only one a week. Food is scarce, water even more so, understandably. He watched the other day a young girl come in from who knows where. He watched the fatigued and zombielike doctors try their best to save her, but fail. He knows that if there was only enough water, her life could have been saved. He himself is hooked up to an IV-like device that has a constant stream of blood flowing through a tube and heated by a little bubbler of boiling water. In anguish, the comedian screams out at the horror of it all and how he wishes he could just give his life to save those around him.

Then a miracle happens. The scene cuts to deep underground; the massive caverns of the water pipes. (picture a parking garage level, with white concrete floor and low ceiling, with huge black metal pipes every few feet, like an endless forest.) Suddenly, the water returns. So sudden and forcefully that it's actually spilling through the pipes' overflow ports all at once everywhere. The workers are screaming in delirious happiness.

The camera pans back to a sight I'll never forget. The labyrinth of pipes goes on *forever* in every direction. Through an amazing series of mirrors, the same set of pipes and people seem to stretch out into infinity. Color returns subtly, in hand-tinted highlights reflecting off the pipes. Water gushes all around. Workers whoop for joy and run about madly.

Up above, there is so much rejoicing that the war is instantly forgotten. At the news of the water returning, combat stops and some enemy soldiers actually embrace one another. They are too exhausted to care about race or country anymore. The war had been up till then one no one could win. It was looking like they'd just go on killing one another until the whole species of mankind died out. Finally, there is a reprieve. The endless battlefield becomes a mad spectacle of joy. Soldiers running about, dancing, falling on their knees in prayer, weeping, drinking, laughing, screaming. The war is over.

The film cuts back to the stunning technicolor of the opening scene. Mr. Brown is once again walking along a blue hallway. this time, the refraction starts immediately, heavier this time so we can't quite see him clearly. Though we can tell his clothes have changed. He stops in front of the lock and the refraction stops too. We see he is wearing a shining metallic suit of emerald green and cobalt blue. But he still has his brown hat. This time, he is smiling brightly and proudly, when before he had no expression like a robot. A beautiful woman in a waterfall-like pearly white ballroom dress joins him at his side and they lock arms and approach the lock. Again we see the shattered face become whole, but this time as the lock clicks, the camera pans back and we see a massive door opening.

One side of a large octagonal tower, made of blue crystal, opens out into a lovely garden. It is arrayed like a hedge maze, but the hedges are so short you only get a sense of design. One can step right over them easy as stepping over a curb. A path runs from the door of the octagon tower through the garden to an arch that leads somewhere beautiful and mysterious (just a glowing white light is all we see). Mr. Brown and Miss White proudly step out into the fresh air and take in a deep breath.

But as the door closes behind them, we see that suddenly there is an immense portrait on the front. A portrait of a stern haggard unsmiling woman with cruelly carved hawklike features, dressed like the queen of hearts, colored in green and blue. She is seen just from the breastline up, with her left arm resting on the frame.

At this point the audiences' jaws all collectively drop as the painting comes to life and becomes an absolutely enormous puppet! Like something right out of Jim Henson's wildest fantasy. The giant face moves and snarls. The woman shakes the frame and the whole portrait comes loose! Tiny feet emerge at the bottom of the frame and the portrait begins to chase after Mr. Brown! He looks back in alarm and he and his companion start to run. The old woman is fast and is just starting to gain on them...

And that's all I remember. Why oh why can my dreams never finish?

Still, this was enough to astound me. The consistent visual style of the film-within-a-dream was perfect. I really believed this was a movie. It reminded me a LOT of the old silent Metropolis, as well as there being hints of The Wizard Of Oz. Overall, I truly wish this movie existed.


*****


-Catgirl Ghosts Of The Pizza Hut

Starting off somewhere in the middle of a long string of forgettable first-person dream snippets, I find myself employed part-time at the Pizza Hut near me. I work only a few days a week, doing various things, and the job itself isn't bad at all. The money's nice too.

At the moment, I'm running a delivery out to some address further down the street. For some reason, each pizza box has a special mini computer chip on it (I guess to track deliveries?) and something's happened with mine that fucks things up intensely. There's a big traffic jam, and maybe a flood, I can't quite remember

When I slink back to the Pizza Hut, a snippy coworker tells me the boss wants to see me right away. No big surprise there. I'm sure I'm about to be fired. The manager; a squat bespectacled woman (who's a lot less mean than she looks) is initially furious at me and starts to harangue me about improperly packing the pizza. However, when I explain that I wasn't the one who packaged the pie, only the one who tried to deliver it, she immediately relents and even apologizes. Whew!

I spend the next few hours waiting tables and such, till I get my paycheck. Then I head towards the bathrooms. But that's not where I'm going.

You see, this Pizza Hut holds a secret very few people know about. Above it, there is a whole other level. It's accessible only by a very narrow staircase leading up from a thin nondescript door nearby the bathrooms. The upper floor is a really old attic house of some long-dead dude. It's also said to be severely haunted.

I know about the place because Mom knew a friend who lived in it for a while. I spent an occasional day there when I was a small kid. I even spent a night sleeping in the old dead dude's bedroom once. Sure, it was a little creepy at first, but I quickly came to like the place.

The attic house has a strikingly unique look about it. The ceiling is very low, and peaks up in the center (picture the inside of a slanted roof). The walls are wood, painted a sort of dark powder blue. It actually looks somewhat like a frontier log cabin. As if by magic, the place is always clean, without a speck of dust anywhere. Another odd thing is that all of the rooms are very wide, with a lot of empty floor space in the middles of rooms. Oddest of all is that the house inside is actually wider than its outside! (Kinda like the Tardis). It's provable, but unexplainable.

Apparently, when the old dead dude vacated the place, some people wanted it torn down because of the bad vibes, others wanted it preserved as a historical site. The former argument won out in the eventual compromise. They left the attic house, but turned the first floor into a commercial space, where the Pizza Hut moved in. The house still existed, but was almost totally out of sight, out of mind.

As to the place being haunted, I know that's true for a fact. How? Because I know the ghosts personally! They are four very cute and sweet-hearted young women. They all look sort of like a cross between Cleo (from Heathcliff) and an anime nekogirl. They are very quintessentially ghost-like. Transparent, with parts of them trailing off into wispy, gauzy nothing. They float about, their long orange-blond hair swirling about them like they were underwater. The ghosts have never let Mom or her friend see them, but they showed themselves to me when I was little because they knew I wouldn't be afraid of them.

As soon as I'm up the stairs, I am greeted by the ghostly catgirls. They've always been crazy about me; doting on me like an adorable pet, which I rather enjoy. I sit cross-legged in the middle of the livingroom and they float about all around me. They giggle and ask how I've been, all the while touching me all over with their slender, semi-noncorporeal hands. I feel totally comfortable with them. The moment isn't spooky or creepy at all. It's completely relaxed and friendly. We always talk for a long time about all sorts of things. They like knowing all about the world outside, since they're unable to leave the house.

They've known me since I was a kid, but now that I'm older, they've gotten frisky and want to 'do things' with me. I don't mind that idea at all. We go into the bedroom and I crawl into the small bed set against the wall and pull the big quilted comforter over me. I believe that me and the ghosts have some fun at this point, but I can't remember now just what happened. (Damn my mind for leaving out the good parts!)

I seem to remember that they like to tease me occasionally about letting them turn me into a ghost like them. While the idea is exciting and yiffy, I'm not entirely sure I really want to do it. And I'm glad to know they'll always honor that. And I know too I'll probably take them up on their offer someday.

Later that night, I'm walking through the place when I come to the small room at the back of the bedroom. It's lit up by a red-orange light, like from a wood-burning stove. There's a TV there, and some show is on. This is weird because I can't remember the TV ever working before. I soon realize that 1) the program is a documentary of the events that happened in this house long, long ago and 2) the events described are so personal, this can't be a real TV show. Something supernatural is afoot, creating the broadcast.

As I watch, I learn that the old dead dude was an extremely bitter old bastard with four lovely daughters. (I immediately recognize my four ghost friends, even without the ears and tails) Each daughter had a cat as a special pet. The old man was really evil to them; I mean criminally evil. He kept them in constant fear, and even raped them whenever he felt like it. As a consequence, two of them got pregnant. The babies were weird mutant things; one half-formed with no legs and the other with bizarre green skin. I see the girls in rocking chairs, nursing these monster babies. The mothers' eyes are hollow and cold. The babies do not live long. All this happened in the very room I'm sitting in now.

In the end, the evil old bastard kills his daughters to cover up his secret. He even kills their cats, too! He eventually dies and the house stands alone. Finally, the girls come back as ghosts. They have somehow each bonded with their pets and become catgirls. Then the TV shuts itself off.

I can't believe what I've seen. I'm incredibly angry and incredibly sad. I walk out of the room, through the bedroom, and in the livingroom, I find the girls. They are huddled together, eyes wide with sadness. They know I know their past now.

There is only one thing I can do. I rush to them and envelop them in a huge hug, starting to cry myself. I do my very best to comfort them. I do my best to let them know that I'm 100% on their side, that I don't think any less of them, and that I'm glad that evil man is dead so he can't hurt them anymore.

They are all very relieved and grateful. They hug me all over. Their smiles are bright on their see-through faces. I feel their airy touches all over as they swirl about me.

As best as I can recall, they did all sorts of strange and interesting ghostly things to me to show how glad they were that we still had our friendship. It's too bad I can't remember any specifics. I know that later that morning, while half-awake, I thought of some things I *wanted* them to do to me, but that's not a part of the actual dream. I must say, out of all the dreams I've had, this is one I'd like to have come true the most. I mean, who wouldn't want to be friends with four sexy catgirl ghosts?


*****


-Fearless Vampire Killers

I'm living in a world that's being terrorized by vampires. They've been around for centuries, but recently a group of them decided to quit slinking around in the shadows and just come right out and eat people. In appearance, they're all very tall, slender and have some traits similar to demons and anime villains. In attitude, they're like a gang of merciless street punks.

I've been recruited by an old man who's known about the vampires for ages and knows also of a race specially bred to destroy them. The old man is lanky, always dressed impeccably, sharp-minded and in damn good shape for his age. The race he talks about are like humans, but they're created in labs. They are immune to vampire bites and are much stronger and more resilient than humans. Each of them gets their power from a set of five or seven small marble-like objects. Each 'marble' [calling them that is like calling an AK47 a pop gun, but it's the best word I have] gives them a specific power. Being separated from them too long can kill. The old man asks me to join him, and he can make me into an extra-powerful vampire killer. I say 'Why not?'

I am transformed and given my own set of 'marbles'. Mine are a dark cloudy blue-black-grey. On my first night out, I find a group of vampires hanging around the intersection of Woodward and 11 Mile. We fight, and while I don't quite kick their asses, I do have the upper hand. Partway through the fight, some other vampires join in. Bad for me. I try to get away. Just then, I am joined by a female of my kind (played by Julia Stiles, I believe). Together, we successfully kill a buncha bad guys. Afterwards, she explains that she's special among her kind. While she was created in a lab like most of the others, one of her 'marbles' wasn't. It sprung into existence on its own. This is some kind of sign that she has an extra special destiny to play in our conflict.

A few days later, I am invited to a party of vampire-killers. It's partly a get-together and partly a way for them to report to one another on how the battle's going in their part of the state. I attend with the old man and the girl. The bouncer knows them and lets them through, but he's never seen me before and looks ready to hurl me out bodily. The old man calms him down and tells me to show my set of 'marbles' (which I keep in a small metal case, like what people keep cigars in). He picks one up and holds it at eye level to gaze into it. Apparently, any one of us can identify one another through our 'marbles'. That person will appear in the center of it, along with their powers. But the bouncer is shocked by what he sees in mine. In it, there is a huge black void with blue fractals spinning inside it.

This is unheard of among this race, but before I can get a chance to ask about it, there's a bigass explosion! It seems the vampires have found our meeting place and bombed it. There's a huge wall of fire racing towards us. With my new heightened abilities, I can actually outrun it. The girl gets to safety first, but the old man doesn't have our powers. I grab him around the waist and drag him with me. I practically toss him behind a big overturned metal desk that will protect him from the blaze. I keep outrunning the fire until I see a small metal table I can duck behind. I brace myself against it with my shoulder. As the wall of fire passes, I can actually feel it slam into me and push me hard backwards! [That's where it ends. Interestingly, the whole dream was a lot like Underworld in theme, and looked as if it was shot with the same film stock used in a lot of 80's horror movies]


*****


-Alien Gadget

I'm a kid again, but an alien kid. Our class has travelled to earth on a field trip to do research on humans. We've all assumed human form and pretend to be kids in a class at my elementary school. We've all been assigned to spy on a certain human and give a report at the end of the week. The fact that we can become non-corporeal and invisible helps a lot. I've been spying on a human teacher in the building. I've just 'borrowed' her purse to sift through it and two of my friends are wondering if that's a bad idea.

I also have a little mouse-size pet Gadget, though I'm not sure if she's a robot or a hologram. Either way, she's a toy programmed to look and act like Gadget and she helps me out a lot.

Later in the day (after I've returned the purse) I've been stopped in the hall by the principal. At first I think I'm in trouble, but he tells me he knows I have sharp eyes, and would I be willing to help them find another teacher's two rings that fell into the garbage accidentally? I agree, happy to help. He leads me to the stairs, which are strewn with trash. A garbage bag apparently burst on the stairs and the rings fell into it there. Thankfully, it's all office trash, so there's nothing in it any yuckier than dust bunnies. I look over the mess and use some alien power to see through and around the trash at once with my mind. I spot the rings easily. One is a thin gold band with a diamond in it, the other has a clear amber-colored square gem in it. Gadget floats over and gets the rings for me (did I mention she can fly? She can hover in midair like a ghost). I ask her to analyze them. She tells me the diamond one is peculiar, not like a real diamond at all. Then she gazes into the square gem. I can see her face reflected in it. "Gollyyyy..." she says. The view in the gem starts to change, showing red swirls around Gadget's face. I fear it's going to hypnotize or hurt her and pull the ring away. These are definitely no ordinary rings. I slip them in my pocket and decide to show them to my alien teacher first. She's more likely to know what they are than I am.


*****


-The Jump / "Birdman"

I'm in sixth grade again. Under the direction of Mrs. Johnson, our class is gonna put on a play. The play is actually a very sophisticated and adult one. It's a war allegory, like Catch-22. I've somehow acquired the lead part, though I'm not sure at first that I really want it.

The action starts in WW2 with my unit on a secret mission, deep in Japan. We're in some important city, like the capitol, and our mission is to infiltrate the main military headquarters and steal some plans (or something). The architecture is all very striking. Very boxy, lots of angular lines, with little or no decoration. In fact, the whole atmosphere of the place serves to create the idea that the Japanese have little or no concept of individuality, that they're like an ant colony. This is reinforced when we come across a group of them, who are all dressed identical, look identical and move simultaneously.

My character is a cocky jerk. A selfish asshole, basically. He's loud, rude, keeps singing all these little racist ditties about 'Japs', and really doesn't care much about anyone besides himself. The other soldiers tolerate him, but barely.

As we're getting closer to our target, another formation of Japanese soldiers suddenly comes pouring out of a nearby door. Unfortunately, they see us and fire on us. We run like rabbits.

Now comes the play's climactic moment. While most of the soldiers run for obvious cover, I (in character) run forwards, still heading for the target, fueled by my own arrogance and thoughts of bravado. I end up on an unfinished set of narrow stone steps jutting out from the side of the building. My bad luck, they stop about twenty feet in the air! However, on the wall opposite me, there's a tiny balcony. It's much too far away to jump to. But, knowing that the Japanese will be in range to fire on him within seconds, my character gathers every ounce of strength, leaps...

...And makes it! Amazingly, he actually leaps, grabs the balcony edge, hoists himself up and completes the rest of the mission on his own.

There's certainly some symbolism and metaphor goin' on there. As I'm reading the play for the first time, I try to figure out exactly what the author's trying to say. That self-centeredness is heroic? Or is it supposed to be ironic? I have no damn clue.

Still, it's my part, so I play it. A lot of the racist dialogue disgusts me to say it. Now, I'm in the first rehearsal of it. We even have some rudimentary sets built up. I'm at the part where the 'hero' is supposed to make his jump. The balcony does look really far away (though it's only a few feet off the ground on stage). My teacher tells me that they'll have a wire harness on me to do the jump. But just for the hell of it, I decide to try it on my own. I take a little running start, leap my ass off, and I make it too!

I'm a little disappointed when, after I get down, I'm the only one that seems impressed with what I've done. In fact, The teacher just goes right into a lesson about backdrops and stage personas. I'm just a bit miffed.

After school, me and some friends get dropped off at one of the kids' parents' boyfriend's house until her mom gets home and can drop the rest of us off. It's raining pretty hard. It's dark in the daytime and the rain is drumming on the roof and the windows. (The house doesn't look like any specific one in my memory, which is unusual for my dreams) The boyfriend seems an affable guy, if a bit frazzled at the thought of babysitting a bunch of kids until his girlfriend gets home. We all sit around the kitchen table, eating snacks and watching the guy's big-screen TV. Some Garfield cartoon is on. I don't remember what it was exactly, except that parts of it seemed a little bizarre for a cartoon.

When the mom got home, the boyfriend switched the TV over to the very, very tail end of a movie. It was called "Birdman" and was easily recognized as belonging to the group of eighties-ish family-friendly fantasy films like The Dark Crystal, The Neverending Story, Legend and plenty of others. You know what I'm talking about: usually a lot of impressive non-CGI special effects, a fair amount of puppetry, fantastic costume and set design, strange crystalline architecture, nifty SFX makeup jobs on the actors, etc, with plots usually based around an everyman with a big heart wandering around in a strange mystical land and eventually saving the whole world.

Since I'm seeing only the very end, I have to try to piece together what happened before (It's not too hard, since this is a pretty formulaic one). There's another dimension where birds and rodents evolved separately into bipedal human-shaped beings. The birds and rats have been at war for as long as anyone can remember. However, the leaders of the two sides have agreed to peace talks. Most of the birds and rats want this since they've gotten pretty sick of the war. Also, an old prophecy says that when peace is about to be achieved, a savior will appear out of nowhere to bring both sides together. The daughter of the bird leader is worried about this, so she uses a magic portal to look into our dimension. She sees an average earth joe who looks a lot like the guy in the prophecy, so she uses some magic machine to give herself the appearance of a human. She goes to Earth and yanks the guy into her dimension. They have all sorts of adventures. Stuff blows up and whatnot.

This brings us to the climactic moment. It takes place in the throne chamber of the birds. The bird leader sits on his throne. He looks like an old grey hawk. His daughter is slender, with fluffy pink and white feathers and a little yellow beak. A lot of bird delegates are also there, all dressed really fancy. Some have huge beaks. (All of them have very impressive makeup jobs and facial prosthesises). The Rat leader and his delegates enter. I notice right away that all the birds' clothes have a constant theme of the color white in them, and all the rats are in darker colors. It also doesn't escape me that all the birds are played by white actors, and the rats by blacks. (These 80s fantasies are not known for the subtlety of their symbolism!) The rat leader is tall and handsome, just dripping with body armor. He and the other rats are covered in coarse dark fur. (Their manner reminds me a little of Klingons, but with a lot more individuality and sense of style)

At some point, I went from watching this on TV, to becoming the human who gets sucked into the bird's dimension. This happens a lot in my dreams.

Now, somehow, the human savior (who's now me) and the princess have discovered that the two leaders are actually plotting to kill off all their own delegates and publicly blame it on one another to keep the war going for whatever insane reason. Even though he's her father, the birdgirl goes against him and we both burst into the meeting to try to warn the delegates of the plot. All hell breaks loose. People start shooting futuristic laser guns everywhere. Scenery blows up. At the end of it, everyone's okay, except for the two leaders, who've killed each other.

The rat delegates all look stunned and shuffle out of the room, knowing the war's just going to go on and on forever now. I notice one rather cute ratgirl at the back who looks rather sad, and I can tell it's because she was really hoping for peace. I call out to the rats, ask them to come back. They do, looking puzzled. I ask everyone if peace is what they truly want, and they assure me they do. I tell them that since the corrupt leaders are gone now, the right thing to do would be to choose new leaders and make peace anyway. There's a burst of relief in the room as everyone agrees. Peace at last!

The movie would have ended there, but I still seem to be stuck in this character, and still vaguely aware of my own personality at the same time! The birdgirl sends me back home, despite both of us wishing I could stay.

It's a few weeks later. I'm in a bank, about to do something that must have been mentioned at the beginning of the movie. Just then, three chunky tough-looking thugs come in and sidle up to me. I somehow know they're from the start of the movie as well. The bank manager asks who they heck they are and one of them replies that they're my 'friends' who have come to help me make a decision. (I'm guessing I either owe them money, or they're trying to steal some from me. Remember, I haven't seen this movie before!)

All of a sudden, six people appear in blazes of fire! (The effect is really nifty: picture a flame suddenly popping into existence, flickering like a tear in the fabric of space/time, and someone steps right through it, like the flame is a doorway) I can recognize all of them as both birds and rats, transformed to humans. A burly bird says that *they're* my friends and they're here to bring me back. I'm all for it, to get myself out of the grip of the goons. They're so scared, they let me go. I go to my friends. The birdgirl hugs me. The ratgirl's there too. The fire suddenly surrounds us.

We are transported back to their dimension. This time, it's by the rat's technology. Another seriously cool effect: we're standing there, and all of our surroundings seem to turn to liquid. It appears as though we're not going anywhere, but the entire dimension is shifting around us. Their world starts to take shape. I see walls and surroundings begin to form. It looks for a second like we're going to be crushed by two big concrete walls, but at the last second they bubble out to become the walls of a big indoor market. The ratgirl smiles smugly, enjoying the look of astonishment on my face.

Me, the birdgirl, the ratgirl and one of their friends (she's in temporary human form too, so I can't tell what species she is) all spend the day at this nifty marketplace. They tell me that it's been neutral territory all this time, that during the war all species could come here to buy or sell, or just get some food and take in a show and relax. The place has some very bizarre architecture. Mostly wood, with low ceilings and lots of twisty, weird angles. Very organic and surprisingly comfortable. The marketplace is known best for all the different kinds of shows they put on. We go and see a free one: a pair of extremely rare ferret-people who do a dance routine. It's easy to tell they're a couple by how romantic their dance is. Plus, being ferrets, they're unbelievably limber. Sitting in the audience, my friends and I share an egg mcmuffin-type thing.

After the show, which is much too short, we go about walking through the market. The birdgirl points out a great big indoor concert hall. She says it used to be the biggest entertainment venue in almost the whole world. I take a look inside and really am amazed. The stage seems miles away. There's a building-sized neon marquee above the stage, and a gigantic TV screen below it. There are more seats than I could possibly count. But what strikes me as odd is that the place is pretty much empty, except for a few people here and there lounging in the seats.

I ask the birdgirl why and she says this used to be where one of the greatest bands in the planet's history played, but they were killed in the war and no one has taken the stage since. She knows that I used to play in a rock band on Earth (at least, the character I'm inhabiting did) and since I'm now a huge celebrity for uniting the two species, she begs me to do a show later tonight. I mull it over. I do seem to have a lot of ingrained talent in my fingers. I try to decide what to play. Given that there's an 80s feel to everything here, I try to think of what kind of rock would go over well here. I'm thinking about trying a sort of Black Sabbath/Asia/ELO fusion (if you can even imagine that!)

The rest of the dream just kind of drifts off into us going around from shop to shop lookin' at stuff.

Stylistically, this dream was very interesting. I just now, while typing this, noticed that the Japanese' architecture in the first half reminds me to a fair degree of some levels from Doom 2, which makes a weird kind of sense. But what really intrigues me is how well the second half mimicked an 80s fantasy movie. Every possible cliche of the genre was there, and yet almost none of it felt directly lifted from any one source. As much as it reminded me of a buttload of movies, (let's add Starman, Transformers, Labyrinth and Tron to the list) it was its own story and seemed completely plausible. I wish I was better at describing things! There were a lot of nifty visuals I wish I could have conveyed better.


*****


-The Crash Of The Ecto 1

It's near the end of the school year, and me and the rest of my class have turned out for the annual Art In The Park parade. It takes place on Woodward avenue every year, just before the Art In The Park festival starts. All the artists drive to the park in either decorated vehicles, or ones that display examples of their work. Not the biggest or flashiest parade in the world, but fun to watch nonetheless. [Art In The Park is a real life event, but the parade was pure dream.]

The whole class is standing around the intersection of Woodward and 11 mile. (interestingly, though I'm supposedly in sixth grade, I seem to be my current age, and so does everyone else!) My best friend Mahesh and his family are here too.

A week ago, in this same location, I had something really weird happen. I was in about the same spot, glancing towards a building on the opposite side of the street, and just for a second I could have sworn I saw the Ecto 1 from Ghostbusters _fly_ down and land on the roof of a building. A few moments later, a man in a car went into that same building by a side entrance using a hidden latch or something on the ground. I've told Mahesh all about this and he, like me, thinks it must be just some funky hallucination.

We're all standing around, watching the parade and discussing our current class assignment; something about having to pick a newspaper comic strip character and write an essay from their point of view. It's more boring than it sounds.

Suddenly, that 'hallucination' I had comes stunningly to life! All eyes are torn from the parade as a perfect recreation of the Ecto 1 comes zooming in over our heads! It seems to have a lot of extra technical gizmos and whatnot all over the roof and back end, which is likely what's making it fly. It swoops and darts around, making it look effortless. It flies completely silently. I can see there's a driver inside, but I can't make out what he looks like. Everyone is just staring up at it in absolute shock and disbelief.

We all watch it swing around in a wobbly semi-oval flight path around the general area of the intersection for a while, making about a dozen loops. But without warning, something goes wrong. The Ecto 1 starts sparking and flames are shooting from the equipment! The stunned silence of the crowd quickly turns to screams, but we're too fascinated by the sight to tear ourselves away. We're all trapped by our own eyes! The fire spreads on the flying car, and small explosions start going off. The most amazing thing is that the car is still hanging there in midair and still going in a circle around the intersection. No one knows if or when it will come crashing to the ground. Parts of it start falling off. More explosions are heard. The fire spreads to the engine. We are staring at a flaming wreck spinning above our heads!

Finally, someone manages to tear their eyes away and start running. It's like it breaks a spell. More and more people start running to safety, but I can't. I'm scared into a statue. My legs won't work, no matter how hard I'm screaming at them.

Above us, the Ecto 1 starts to break up. Parts are falling like fiery rain. The whole body of the car is disintegrating, but the machinery on the roof is still holding it up. As I watch, the whole front end and body splinter and hang limply underneath, as if someone reached out and squeezed them in a giant hand. And then the inevitable happens. The flight machinery finally gives out and begins to descend in a slow arc towards an area somewhere behind the Y.M.C.A. As soon as it hits the ground, there is a *huge* explosion. Smoke and ash fill the air. Fiery debris is falling everywhere! I find myself somewhere in the center of the intersection, chaos and fire all around me, blinded by the smoke and barely able to make myself move at all.

Eventually I end up far enough away from the smoke to see again. Luckily, I manage to meet up with my friend's family again, and all of them escaped unharmed as well. Mahesh is especially glad to see that I'm still okay. His three sisters seem _really_ shaken up and are hugging each other for comfort. I look around and realize we're nearby that building I saw the Ecto 1 land on a week ago. I look around for the entrance I saw the man go into, and find it. I ask them to look around for something on the ground to push to make the door open. Mahesh's mom spots it first, a little foot pedal disguised to look sort of like a rock. I step on it, and the door opens.

But do we dare go inside? This building could be anything, maybe even a government research lab. We all decide to chance it, since we want to know what in the hell just happened out there. We file inside, down to a little basement area.

Further down, we come into what's obviously a mechanical research lab. It's very spacious, with lots of people all around building things. We can see the spark of a welder's torch going off every now and then.

A young blond woman comes up wearing safety glasses and asks who we are, but not in a tone like we were trespassers, just as if we were visiting. That, and the non-government logo on her vest lets us know this is probably a self-run or corporate lab. I ask the woman if she knows about a flying car. She says of course she does, her father made one and was going to try another test run of it sometime today. She asks if we've seen it. Oh God, she has no idea of what happened. I can't bear to tell her that her father is almost certainly dead.

I'm spared that unpleasant task when a man in a suit comes in. He obviously knows what happened and looks both terrified and angry. He asks who the hell we are. I introduce myself and Mahesh's family do likewise. It turns out this guy actually is from the government, which is sponsoring this lab, and is trying desperately to figure out what the hell to say when the news media finds out where that flying bomb came from. There's no denying it happened, obviously. At least a few people must have had cameras recording that thing. Footage of it is probably on the news right now.

That's where the dream fades out, with the family and I standing around as the whole lab spins into confusion and chaos. Obviously, an unsettling dream. It had a 'bad vibe' even before the Ecto 1 started crashing. This one had perfectly realized and completely realistic visuals. I totally believed I was there. I was feeling real panic at that part where I was lost in the intersection. I guess the world just isn't ready for flying cars. My dreamworld sure isn't!


*****


-The Great Robot Museum Heist

Wow! I dreamed an entire '80s-type movie, and most of it all fits together cohesively!

The action takes place far, far ahead in the future. The setting is a prestigious university, and more specifically, the world-renowned history museum they have on campus grounds. It houses all sorts of artifacts from the past (meaning the 20th century).

In this time, technology has evolved so far beyond what we have now that you could consider it magic. In the opening prologue, we're panning through the campus grounds (Lots of arc-based architecture and bright, simple 'Crayola marker' colors) and a robotic elephant made of conical shapes lumbers out into the center of a room. It seems made out of newspaper. Panning further in, we pass a cafeteria area (probably) where lots of people are gathered. We see the same newspaper-like objects all over. They are a special substance that can be molded into just about anything by the owner. They can be very useful, as well as a plaything. Two kids are playing with them. One has a cat-shaped one, the other a dog-shaped one. The dog pounces on the cat and rips it up. It looks just like regular newspaper inside.

We pan further in, towards the museum. They have a very effective security system. In each entrance and exit there are a series of glass slides that lock into place. (like in Star Wars, Episode 1) This is as much to seal people out as the several thousand volt charge that runs through the glass panels when they're closed. (Electricity-conducting glass? Hey, it's the future!) Each glass panel has a different color around the edge. There are also single glass panels at various points inside the museum for added security.

The other big leap in technology in this future is AI. It's so commonplace now, it's in just about everything. Mannequins, servant androids, performing androids and even most stuffed animals! These beings are almost all as smart as a person, with emotions as well. However, the humans treat them like objects anyway. Needless to say, a lot of robots are secretly pissed at this treatment, but are afraid to say so for fear of being destroyed.

In another interesting twist, the androids of this time are almost more human than the humans are. The humans now take themselves way too seriously. Laughter is hardly heard anywhere. In fact, comedic things in general are seen as vulgar and worthless. Most peoples' emotions are crisp and controlled. They act more robotic than the robots. The robots, on the other hand, enjoy their emotional capabilities as much as possible. This is another reason the humans see themselves as being below them.

Our story begins one night in the museum, in the wing devoted to twentieth century toys and media. The room is very large, a bit bigger than a high school gym. A wall that doesn't touch the sides or ceiling of the room divides it into a third on one side and two thirds on the other. The third part is mostly for toys, the other two-thirds for media. In the center along the front wall is a small stage, and another connected one just beside it to the left. There are large exits to either side of the room, protected by those glass panels. Glass panels can also slide out of either side of the central wall to seal off the two areas if need be. The room is colored mostly in dull warm shades of grey-violet and grey-blue.

The board members of the museum are putting on a show for their contributors. Mostly, they're showing off how well-behaved their robot mannequins are. There are quite a few robots that 'live' in the museum that serve as informational guides, or as parts of exhibits. As part of the show, four or so 'dumb blonde bots' are dancing. The blondbots are made to look like pretty human girls. They're not quite as intelligent as the other robots, but they're able to perform tasks and hold a conversation. (About the same IQ as your average mall brat!) On the other stage, a robot band are playing. They're sort of a country-tinged '80s rock band. While all of the robots are pretending to have a good time, they all feel degraded. The humans are all laughing at them, as if they were trained puppies. There was actually a very strong and disturbing 'minstrel show' feel to this part that really suited the dynamic between the humans and robots.

As the show ends, the museum contributors and the board file out, leaving just the museum's curator and the robots. It's the very end of the night, only an hour till midnight, but the museum can't close yet. A special group wants a private tour of this part of the museum. The group have told the museum curator that they're private collectors, and all very rich. They might be looking to buy some of the items in the museum, regardless of price. The curator is happy to receive their money, but really wants to go home soon.

What the group hasn't told him is that they're not collectors at all. They're not even human! They're a group of rogue robots, tired of oppression by humans, that have banded together to make their own living by robbing humans blind! Their leaders are a charming, likeable fellow (played by Steve Gutenberg) and his sexy auburn-haired mannequin girlfriend (played by some generic widely-known '80s actress). They've enlisted the help of all the museum's robots in the heist. The museum robots are only too happy to join up, since it means they'll be able to escape the museum forever afterwards. One of the robots enlisted is the museum's janitor, Barf. (Yes, John Candy playing Barf from Spaceballs!). There were too many characters to list, but some were a hardened cynical thiefbot (Denis Leary), a thoughtful young bot (Kirk Cameron) and a rather cute blonde female mannequin robot named Yahoo. Yahoo has no arms or legs, just smooth stumps, but she gets around surprisingly well. She's wearing a hot-pink-with-white-striped headband, top and shorts. (Not sure why her character was so well-defined) There are also several stuffed animal thieves helping out, among them a red male bunny, a purple girl raccoon and a cute yellow girl bunny. The plushes are doing their best to keep out of sight of the humans for now.

The thieves' plan is to loot the museum blind. They have no need for the items themselves, but they're in touch with several rabid collectors who are very interested in several items on display there and will pay insane prices for them. They have to get all their 'shopping' done before midnight, because twice each day at twelve AM and PM, all the glass panels in the entire museum close just for a second as a test of the system. The thieves have figured out a way to escape that uses the very thing that's supposed to keep them trapped. Gutenberg and Barf have a transporter machine that they've secretly patched into the museum's power grid. When all the glass panels close, it will set up a circuit. A transportation beam will pass through every panel, lock onto our heroes, and send them and their loot far away.

At the moment, they are trying to appear nonchalant. The museum's curator is still there, and they have to pretend to be just admiring and appraising the exhibits. In reality, they're doing all sorts of sneaky secret stuff to the cases and the artifacts so that just before midnight they can snatch them and run. Some of the thieves are skillfully cutting away glass from display cases. One robot sneaks an old plastic toy semi truck from its case to look at it more closely. The curator comes by and the robot just about panics. He hopes the curator won't notice the missing toy. Thankfully, he doesn't. The robot slips it back in with a sigh of relief.

A cluster of bots are gathered around several models of Star Trek ships. The Klingon, Romulan and Ferengi ships are recreations for the display, but the Enterprise is a real scale model used on the TV show, and it's their big ticket item. The collector who wants this is willing to pay a BUNCH of money. However, he wants a mint-condition one, and the museum's one is kinda beat up. So as most of the bots distract the curator, Barf shoots the model with a little raygun thing that shoots a blue-white beam of energy that actually repairs the model back to its original condition.

However, something goes wrong, and the curator keeps them there past midnight. It's a setback, but not a huge one. The robots sneak back in later with the help of Barf and the other museumbots. They'll just have to stay there till noon tomorrow for another shot. And since the museum won't be open tomorrow, they don't have to worry about being sneaky anymore.

Three words: WILD ROBOT PARTY!

All the bots go nuts; dancing, singing, laughing, having a great time. A lot of them bust open display cases to play with the stuff inside. There's a small room set in the front wall (other side of the two stages) with video games and pinball machines inside. Several robots plug them in and go to town on them. Gutenberg and his girlfriend make out. The stuffed animals run around wildly. The blondbots surround a small island display of 20th century magazines. They smash open the case and take a look at the magazines. Yahoo is on the floor looking through a magazine by turning the pages with her nose. Kirk Cameron goes into the media section and learns about the books of the past and of several great novels of the time that have somehow been lost forever. Gutenberg's girlfriend gets nekkid and pretends to take a shower in a part of the museum that has a model of a 20th century bathroom. A lot of other robots get up on the stage and dance, with the robot band playing rockin' music.

Cut to early the next day. All but a few of the robots are tired from their night-long party. One of them, a human-sized furry robot (not sure what animal), is still playing video games; four at once actually! But for the most part, they're all tired.

It's about then that they make an interesting discovery. Some of the stuffed animals are wandering around aimlessly. (At one point, the red bunny pisses of another one, who whips out a sharp piece of metal and stabs the red bunny. He just looks unamused. Since he's a stuffed animal, it didn't affect him at all. He even stabs the raccoon girl for effect, and she's only mildly surprised by it. The attacker feels a little dumb.) Anyway, they come upon an exhibit that's hidden from the public. The other robots come over to check it out. It's a brief history of comic strips and comic books. (I mentioned earlier that this society finds comedic material to be no better than street drugs, so it's understandable that this exhibit would be kept hidden.) The robots look over some very old newspaper comics and enjoy the simple humor of them. It makes them wonder just how crazy the humans are that they'd turn their backs on humor in the first place.

It's approaching noon. Barf wakes up in a glassed-in garden somewhere in the museum, and realizes there's not much time left before their last chance to get the hell out of there. He alerts the others, and they all loot the place good. They even take all the comics and comic books. Not only are they sure someone out there will pay huge money for them, but they want to spend more time looking at the stuff too.

They have the place cleaned out, holding armfuls of stuff, just waiting for noon. Everything's ready, but then disaster strikes.

In comes the curator and the board members! The robots initially panic. Since the humans have come in from the two-thirds side and there's the wall there, they can't see most of the damage yet, but they will if they get any closer. The robots decide to send the blondbots out to put on a show to distract the humans. The blondbots sing their hearts out, and most of the other robots join in. The humans groove on it and are sufficiently distracted. As the clock creeps closer to noon, the blondbots quickly get off stage and back into the one-third side (they all have to be in the same room for it to work). All the robots are clustered together, holding their loot when...

The glass panels slide shut all over the museum, and as soon as they do, a lightning bolt of yellow-green energy ripples through the center of each panel, connecting them all in a gigantic web. It meets in the room with the robots, envelops them all, and they're gone. Success!

Wondering what they hell that was all about, the humans go into the third side and freak out when they realize everything's missing.

They find the university's yearbook there, opened on purpose to a specific page. There is a small section about the yellow plush bunny. She was actually a very advanced AI, and tried and tried to get into the college as a student, despite her appearance. She had the intelligence, but the college was too prejudiced against robots to let her attend. However, enough human students liked her that they were able to make her sort of a mascot. The bunny has scribbled a little note in the margins that she was the one who contacted the thieves and helped plan the whole thing as her little revenge for not being taken seriously!

All in all, an incredibly nifty dream. There was lots more details, but they sort of flickered out here and there. Interestingly, the bulk of the dream came first, and then after I woke up, I was thinking about it and when I dozed off, I dreamed even more of it. This happened at least twice. This kind of continuation has never happened to me before, at least not where the new elements fit so well with the ones that came before. The basic structure of the museum room, for instance, never changed once throughout the whole dream.


*****


-The Rescue Rangers Versus Robocop

This is what I get for watching The Triplets Of Belleville, Dawn Of The Dead, most of Swordfish and reading half of the fanfic Out Of Range all in one day...

It begins in a parallel Earth, far far ahead in a rather grimy cyberpunk future. Kinda like the bloated, technologically-saturated vice-infested worlds of, say, Total Recall or Johnny Mnemonic. A cynical place where the rich have gotten richer and the poor have gotten shafted even worse.

In this parallel world, the big cities are bustling, crowded, crime-ridden and pumped full of technology that runs everything. But the machines that run the machines are all kept out of sight. Beneath the city streets, reaching out to the outskirts, are vast, mostly subterranean areas called 'machine zones'. This is where all the city services, the sewers and the factories are. All of it's done by machines; all the jobs people don't want to have anything to do with. It's like the gearwork hidden behind the facade of the cuckoo clock. There aren't many species that can live there, but the ones that do make sewer rats look like newborn puppies.

(Also in this world, humans and anthros live side by side, without a thought given to species. I also got the impression that there were more humans around than furries.)

But in this dark place, there is also hope. There are two huge cities, both connected on opposite sides by a huge machine zone that bridges the land between them, where champions live. New York has the Rescue Rangers, and Ederopolis has Robocop.

First, to the Rangers. Gadget is taking on a case by herself. Fat Cat has captured a human woman's daughter for ransom. Gadget and the girl's mother have teamed up to find Fat Cat's current hideout. He's stolen a small three-car train that trundles slowly along a track in the area just below the city, but just above the machine zone. Fat Cat is not stupid; this twilight area is the best place for him to be to hide from the surface and still keep away from the things that lurk farther down.

Gadget and the mother manage to sneak aboard. The train is very well furnished inside, like a little house on wheels. The two women sneak over to an area with lots of books and a very old mustachioed mouse dozing in a chair with a plain sombrero on his head. They're about to go into the next car when a henchrat comes in suddenly and gets the drop on them. He doesn't know that he's caught the hostage's mother and a rescue ranger. He thinks they're just random intruders. He pulls his gun on them. He notices the sleeping old mouse. Not wanting any witnesses, he goes over and shouts at him to go away. The mouse doesn't flinch. He yells again, with no reaction, and assumes the mouse is so deep in sleep that nothing will wake him up.

The henchrat turns back to Gadget and the mother. "I'm gonna shoot you on the count of three," he says. Gadget has, of course, already planned how to knock him out and get out of here, she's just waiting for the right moment. The henchrat puts his finger on the trigger. "One..."

BANG!

The henchrat slumps to the floor. Flabbergasted, Gadget and the mother look around and see that the old mouse is now looking perfectly awake and alert, and is holding a small smoking pistol in his lap. "He was not a very nice person, si?"

They are grateful for the old mouse's help, but that gunshot has brought the attention of the other thugs. Gadget manages to escape, but the mother decides to stay behind so she can see her daughter again. They reunite in the front car, where Fat Cat sits on a plush couch. He's upset by all the commotion, and pissed off that a Rescue Ranger was here. Though he does show some decency; when he finds out the henchrat was going to shoot Gadget and the mother, he apologizes to the mother and child, explaining that the henchrat was stupid and acting on his own. He actually offers a handshake and says "No hard feelings?"

Gadget got away, but it was only by jumping out of a moving train and landing somewhere in the machine zone. She's hurt, but not too badly. Luckily she has a tracking device on her, and she calls the other rangers to come find her.

Now, we switch to the other city, and to Robocop. In this world, he's a mouse, not a human. He's walking outside the police station when his boss comes up and tells him there's reports of bad doin's in the machine zone, and he should get there right away.

Robocop wastes no time at all. He spots a garbage train nearby about to leave (this is a bullet-train-shaped automated machine that carries garbage from the city down a corkscrew-shaped tunnel to the machine zone to dump it). He reaches out and grabs onto the back of it, and easily holds on as it takes off downwards at a screamingly fast pace.

It slows after a bit, and Robocop leaps off when he notices some creatures huddled in the tunnel. They're green-skinned frog-things, looking something like sea-monkey illustrations and something like gremlins. They're one of few species that live in the machine zone. Each one is about half a person's height and just barely intelligent enough to talk. Alone, they're pretty wimpy specimens, but their strength lies in their numbers. Hundreds of them live together in gang-groups. They defend each other fiercely.

There are three of the frog-things gathered by the side of the tunnel, looking miserable. Robocop is surprised, since seeing so few at once is unusual. They're afraid at first, but he explains he only wants to help. They tell him that they were separated from their group and can't get home. Robocop figures out where they're supposed to be. Further down the tunnel, he comes to a manhole, hooks one finger into the slot in the side and lifts it like it weighed nothing. The frog-things follow him down the hole.

They are now deep in the machine zone. They emerge from a long tunnel with cables running along the walls to see an immense flat area. No trees or anything green. Just concrete and cables and buildings and machines as far as they eye can see. Somewhere behind them is Ederopolis, and somewhere far, far ahead is New York. Up ahead, Robocop spots dozens and dozens of frog-things sitting on the edge of an aqueduct, just hanging out and talking loudly. The three frog-things go off to join their group, and Robocop goes off to start his mission.

Meanwhile, the Rangers have located Gadget. They're all together in a nifty armored army-ish transport vehicle that Gadget made. It's gotten dark quickly, and they're driving around looking for someplace safe to spend the night, since they won't be able to find their way out soon enough, and Gadget needs her wounds looked at.

They drive a long time before spotting a factory in the distance. Bright orange light pours from it, coming from the machines inside doing their work. The factory is a big orange brick box, obviously designed as a place living people didn't need to be in. The Rangers make it there and 'set up camp'. Gadget gets the attention she needs, and they all relax.

But later that night, their peace is shattered. They become aware that a squad of people is coming towards them. It's too dark to see who they are, but they walk in formation like military men, and they don't look friendly. The Rangers hide in the rafters as the men approach.

What they don't know is that this is a group of Robocop's special officers. He saw the Rangers' vehicle from far away, and assumed they were the criminals he's looking for down here. When they reached the factory, he called in a squad of men to capture them.

The officers creep silently into the still bright factory. The male Rangers slip out, just as silent, trying to get a look at who's coming. But they've underestimated their opponent. The officers quickly surround the Rangers and cut off their escape routes. Though they struggle wildly, the Rangers are all tied up securely, put into big white cloth sacks and stacked in a pile.

Gadget watches from the shadows, horrified. She knows it's up to her now. She can see Robocop right below her, giving orders. She doesn't know who he is, and assumes he's another criminal fiend like Fat Cat. There's only one thing she can do, and it's nearly suicidal. But she has to, to save her friends.

Dropping silent like a ninja, Gadget jumps down to land precisely behind Robocop. She has a sharp piece of metal in her paw and she goes right for the only vulnerable spot on his armored body: the little bit of exposed neck between his chestplate and helmet. "Alright, listen up!" she shouts with all her courage. "Let my friends go right now or I'll kill your boss!" The officers all freeze, not knowing what to do.

But before things can get worse, something wonderful happens. Robocop recognizes that voice. He lifts off his helmet to reveal his true identity...

"Daddy!?"

It's Geegaw Hackwrench! Though she thought he was dead, he'd actually been revived and made into Robocop by the Ederopolis police force. His circuit-riddled brain hadn't been able to remember much of his past, and he was only now able to remember Gadget by her voice. The two of them hug tenderly and Geegaw orders his men to let Gadget's friends out of their restraints right away.

I woke up just then, but I'm sure that the Rangers and Robocop teamed up to find the criminals in the machine zone and go back and rescue the mom and daughter from Fat Cat.

(Interesting note: I realized only after waking up that Edoropolis was the home city of the Samurai Pizza Cats, and should actually be in Japan. But this was clearly the name of New York's sister city, except spelled with an 'e' instead of an 'o'.)


*****


-Curse Of The Shrine

Yet another dream where I perceive it to be a movie, with me as the main character.

I'm just an ordinary kid going to school in some odd little town. Where I live is on a strange tiered cliffside above the ocean. The cliff has been cut into 'shelves'; each one like a different street. My street is a typical American suburbia place, but arranged like a long strip mall. Below us is a Japanese-American community, and below them, one whole shelf is taken up by a huge Japanese shrine. Even though it's on American soil, it's still an incredibly holy and important place to them.

One day at school, I find out from a teacher that some spooky shit has been going on at the shrine recently. Apparently, a bunch of Americans desecrated the place and got the old couple who live there furious. Heedless of the consequences, the old man in the shrine put a curse on it that conjured up a demon spirit that would kill anyone who even looked at the shrine. Since then, the bodies are starting to pile up.

At first I'm just creeped out by it. But later on when I get home, I find out that I'm somehow destined to be the one to break the curse. For one thing, the old man who set the curse is incredibly sorry that he put it on the shrine; he didn't actually believe it really would bring the demon. For another, I know that some shadowy figure who menaced my early childhood and that of my friends has shown up as well. The memories of him are hazy, probably repressed, but I know he's evil and I have to find him and stop him. I at first try to gather my old friends to help me stop the 'man in grey', but after we've talked a while about the good old days, and I bring up the subject, they get uncomfortable and decline. Looks like I'm on my own.

I begin to see strange spirits who are helping to guide me on my quest. All of them are strange entities, all looking like geometrical shapes, but the only one I remember clearly was Mister Seven. Apparently, Mister Six had told me that Seven would provide some great wisdom to me. I look for him in the parking lot outside the library. I spot Mister Seven easily. His head looks like a giant french fry with a face on it. I go up to him and he starts talking to me in a very calm, wise-sounding voice. When I ask for his advice, instantly he starts screaming accusations at me! He looks crazy and furious as he tells me how ashamed of myself I should be for taking on this quest. I notice that as he talks, his head starts turning into a big floating cardboard box, and his words turn into just crazy babble. Finally, to shut him up, I just cut along one side of him with the scissors (by now he's turned into a paper grocery bag) and toss him out a window. As near as I can figure, his wisdom to me was to not listen to those that would dissuade me from my quest. Later on, I encounter Mister Eight and Mister Nine, who give me the final pieces of the puzzle.

I hop into the back of a moving van that's headed in the direction I need to go. Later that night, I have to steal a car. I'm out on this long, infinitely complex highway structure. The cops see me and chase me. But I get some kind of spiritual help and my car goes faster than they can hope to keep up with. I'm going so fast, I'm leaping right over the twists and turns in the immense freeway. At one point, I even sail across a huge 'canyon' between two sections of it.

I journey on. In the final leg of my quest, I get on a great big school bus. I meet up with my old friends from my early childhood. They've decided not to cower at home and to help join me in my quest. The bus ride is long, and we talk about all sorts of things, mostly reminiscing about our childhood.

The bus pulls up at a big school-type place (I'm not sure what it was) and there are a heck of a lot of people flocking there. In the crowd, I spot the evil 'man in grey'. I leave my friends to deal with his threat. I've got to find out how to lift the curse on the shrine.

I wander around til I come to a small building with a large, open room where lots of people are sitting on the wood floor, listening to some guy give a speech. To my surprise, I notice a girl in the audience who's the daughter of the old couple from the shrine. This has to be more than a coincidence, so I go over to sit by her. (She's played by the actress who was Gogo Yubari in Kill Bill.)

As we talk, I realize that she's been here all this time and has no idea what's been going on back at the shrine. I show her a news article about the killings, and the pictures are really grisly. There have been thirty-four deaths so far, mostly girls, and the pictures show their screaming heads lying around, cut up, on the bloody floor of the shrine. She's as horrified by the pics as I am.

She's really freaked out, and I do my best to console her. At some point, she shows me a picture she carries with her of the shrine. Too late, I realize that I've just looked at the shrine, and the demon spirit might be coming for me next. The two of us are looking at the newspaper article, trying to find some clues, when underneath the paper we see a pair of pink shoes with little tassels walk past. When we lay the paper down, we realize the shoes are walking all by themselves! The girl screams. Everyone stares at her because the shoes are invisible to everyone else but her and me. Knowing this is the demon spirit, I beg it; 'not in front of all these innocent people!'. It seems to agree to that, as the shoes start off in another direction, through a tiny door into a little kitchen area. We follow it.

Once inside the tiny kitchen, the spirit reveals itself. It looks like a young Japanese schoolgirl, but her skin is chalk white and her eyes are red with bloody tears. It's obvious she was a girl once, but has become a host to some evil presence. The girl recognizes the spirit as her sister who was murdered at the shrine. Well, that certainly explains some things.

The spirit-girl is slumped in a corner, crying. She looks torn between rage and sadness. I can guess that she's being used by some evil presence to be the instrument of the curse, but the part of her that's still human is horrified by the killings and just wants everything to stop. I go over to her, kneel at her side and ask her what I can do to help. Through tears, she tells me the ritual to break the curse. She hands me a videotape and tells me to burn it over a stove burner. I ask her if the filmmaker shot pictures of the shrine on the tape. No, she explains that in the original ritual, part of it was burning a brick of pressed corn. Since the movie on the tape contains a scene of people harvesting corn, and it's brick shaped, it will work as a substitution. Odd, but it seems to do the job. I follow the spirit-girl's instructions and the curse is broken. She goes on to her peaceful afterlife, and there will be no more killings.

I don't specifically see whether or not my old friends have defeated the 'man in grey', but I can assume that they have.

The girl and I return home. We have become good friends by now. When I get back to my house, at first everyone is in disbelief, thinking I was gone forever. Then I receive a truckload of hero's welcome-home hugs. I learn later that the curse has indeed been lifted from the shrine, and that that curse will never be used again forever. It's over.

(A pretty nifty storyline. It reminded me in a lot of places of modern Asian horror flicks, like Ringu. Especially the pictures of the chopped-up heads. Interesting also is that this is one of the few movie-like dreams I can remember that came to a clear resolution. Nifty.)


*****


-Tarantulady

Inspired by the actual user name of an author on Yiffstar, I had this fleeting concept:

I'm watching a movie that I've written the screenplay for. I've had a few other blockbuster hits before. My formula for success is that I get really excellent Japanese anime directors to direct my films in live action. The blending of styles works wonders.

The movie itself takes place in a twisted, apocalyptic future with giant, boxy cities. There is no government anymore. The people running the world are the owners of the company that manufactures highly addictive drugs. They're the only ones in the world that aren't addicted to them, so they control everyone else.

However, a new force has risen to rile up the masses. She calls herself 'Tarantulady'. She's a young Latino woman who's created a mechanical harness that gives her eight bladelike legs that can carry her anywhere or act as weapons (the overall look is like Doctor Octopus crossed with Blackarachnia). They also look _really_ cool. She considers herself a villain, because she uses her machine to steal from the drug company, but a lot of people are secretly cheering her on.

The drug company discovers where she lives, and late one night send out a fleet of small, hovering spy ships with big spotlights on their front ends to capture her. An amplified voice wakes up the whole neighborhood, announcing the woman like she was a game show contestant! The idea is to get all her neighbors to turn on her and capture her. But it doesn't work. Tarantulady manages to strap on all her gear, wish her dad (who lives with her in the tiny apartment) a goodbye, and make a dramatic escape. The neighbors don't make a move to stop her.

So, the company tries something new. They hire an expert cop to track her down. The cop is short and heavyset, but sounds like Samuel L. Jackson. We first meet him at this little beach hotdog stand. The guy he's after (who looks a little Dave Chapelle-ish) is right in the middle of eating his lunch. The cop comes up and introduces himself. The perp gets a frantic look in his eye, like he's about to make a run for it or pull a gun. The cop casually advises him not to. He'll let him finish his lunch, because it would be rude not to, "...but you should know I can whip my gun out faster than you could possibly make a move." The cop spots something among the perp's food. "Say, is that a Cadbury creme egg? Those are good! Tell you what, I'll get a year shaved off your sentence if you let me have that." The perp's astounded, but the cop apparently means it. So, he lets the cop have the egg, and afterwards gets hauled off to face justice.

While being aware that the main plot of the story was the cop and Tarantulady being pit against one another and the slow realization that they're both actually good guys, I didn't get to see that part. I woke up too soon. Damn.


*****


-Close Encounters Of The Dude Kind

It's late at night, and four gen-x buddies are walking home from wherever they've spent the day having fun.

They're passing by the high school, and in the alley just behind it is a jukebox that's set up like a soda machine. It lists the songs on the front, you pop in your quarter, and you get some tunes to dance around to, often when kids are getting out of school.

One of the dudes notices a total blast from the past on the jukebox's playlist; a very early-nineties fake rap song, put out by the military, warning kids not to have any kind of contact with aliens. Apparently during that time period there was lots of UFO activity, and the nation as a whole was just paranoid enough to make this weird little ditty a hit. The dude feeds the machine, and the hilariously awful song comes on.

The four friends are laughing and dancing through the high school parking lot. A streetlight casts their long, distorted shadows on the wall of the high school, and they have even more fun trying to make them look like strange alien monsters.

Their shadows blur together, and it takes a while for the first dude to notice that there are actually five shadows being cast on the building. One of them is a small person with a huge head standing there waving his arms. When he turns around to look, his blood runs cold at the sight of a 'grey' alien standing right there amongst them!

The alien, however, is a friendly guy, and he comes over to shake hands with them. They're all freaked out, but begin to feel relieved. The alien actually speaks perfect English, and he starts chatting pleasantly about visiting Earth and such.

They ask him if it isn't dangerous to visit such a messed-up planet as Earth, but the little Grey just shrugs it off. He asks, if it were really dangerous, would he have brought his wives and kids here? And he shows them a wallet-type photo of two female aliens holding four cute little baby Greys. The dudes all 'Awww!'. One asks if they're down here too, and their alien buddy tells them no, that they're still up in the ship.

He points upwards to a truly amazing sight. Half-hidden in a dark cloud is a totally enormous spaceship! It's as big as a house! Standard flying-saucer configuration, but this one has some style. It's angled with a rakish tilt, and has nifty green, pink and blue lights flashing on it. This is the 'sporty' model.

To the dudes' jaw-dropping delight, their new pal whips out a remote control (odd, since he's nekkid) and makes the lights on his ship flash in all sorts of crazy ways. At one point it even lights up so bright it's almost like daytime! He even makes it thrum the five note melody from Close Encounters at their request!

The fun doesn't last forever though. A little while later, a bunch of military police vehicles show up and surround the dudes. The alien vanishes. The MPs slam the four friends up against a chainlink fence and growl menacingly at them. Apparently, it's against the law to have any contact with an extraterrestrial being.

Just when the dudes think they're fucked, their alien friend comes to the rescue. He appears again in the thick of all the MPs, and calmly uses his remote to bring his immense ship to hover menacingly at the MPs. They get the hint, and lay off the four dudes.

One of them's still pissed off though, and he takes the opportunity to turn on the MP that slammed him against the fence and knee him in the crotch! Just hard enough to get his point across. He snarls that they (meaning the military guys) better lay off. Zero's a nice guy, he says (somehow they came up with that nickname for their alien friend). And considering that the juke was playing that dumb anti-alien song that the military created, he emphasizes with another knee-kick, they'd better consider themselves really lucky that Zero's got a good sense of humor.

I believe the alarm clock kicked in right about then, so the scene was left at the military guys stymied, and our heroes coming out on top. Maybe Zero'd offer the dudes a ride home?


*****


-Building A Lake

Back in high school, once again, but this time the school's actually really nifty looking. It's also many years in the future, in a more stable, eco-friendly time.

There's a kid out there (who looks like Jason Schwartzman) who wound up with a huge amount of money while he was still in high school and he figured out a great way to use it. He wrote a book which sparked a series of 'contests' in all the schools across America. The basic idea was that students would brainstorm ideas on how to make the school better and send them in to this kid's foundation. The best, most creative ideas would be recognized by the foundation, and then they would pay for the project 100%. But only on the condition that the students themselves would be in charge of implementing the idea and the one who proposed it would be in charge. Reinforcing that just having good ideas is not enough; you have to work for them.

(In the book, two of the ideas mentioned were one school that had nifty 'themed' days in the cafeteria, including a picture of a spaceship made of snack foods, and another was a kid who got regular school parties okayed, along with permission to sell 'clearbeer'; a beverage that looks and tastes like beer but is 100% alcohol-free)

Out by the school, there was a gigantic hole in the ground from a construction project that was abandoned. I got the idea to fill it in and make a little lake out of it. Make it look nice, like a part of the woods that encircles the place.

My idea was one of the ones accepted, and so I picked out a team and we all went to work. We only had a set amount of time to do it in, too. So for the next month or so, we studied all about how to go about doing something like this, and a major task was leveling out the dirt, changing it from a steep drop to a gentle incline.

Near the end of a month or so's worth of hard but satisfying labor, we'd gotten everything looking pretty good. It really was a lake now, and you could paddle boats around in it. We had grass growing up on the dirt incline, but it still looked a little bare. With but one more day to go on the project, I got the idea we should put some colorful flowers or plants there...

Somehow, the dream switched to an almost Pahlahniuk-ish scenario that was taking place in the same reality at the same time, just a few blocks from the school. There's a demon who's been sent up from hell on a sort of rite of passage task. He looks just like a regular, scruffy human. Scuffed red leather jacket, jeans, facial hair like Ryan Reynolds. His task is to kill and collect the soul of an average but crafty guy (sort of like an evil Ben Affleck or Edward Norton). So, the demon sneaks into his house, but the guy is cleverer than he looks, and he keeps outwitting the demon.

One morning, the guy's just about to go to work. He checks all over the house for the demon. He seems more canny than afraid, as if he's the hunter, not the prey. Finally he leaves, and we see the demon pop out of a wastebasket that's about ten times smaller than he is. He looks around and goes off into the house sneakily. But from our perspective, we can see the guy he's hunting turn around and sneak back into the house too. Both of them think they've outsmarted each other.

We don't get to find out what happens to the two of them just yet, because then it cuts back to me. It's a nice almost-summer morning and I'm looking all over the neighborhood for some nice, pretty plant we can make cuttings of and plant all over our project. I pass a guy on the street and, not knowing he's really the demon, ask him if he knows of any eye-catching plantlife in the area. He seems a bit depressed, but points out some giant pink sunflowers we pass by. "Those are nice, but they spread like fuckin' weeds." Hey, perfect!

A little later, I pass by the elementary school. Kids are runnin' around in the playground. I notice a little young skunk (maybe a zorille) waddling around curiously, but no one seems to mind him being there at all. There's a pudgy black reporter there, and she sees him and says, "A skunk! Awww, how cute!" And with no fear, picks the little guy up and lets him walk on her. This futureworld has apparently also figured out how to make humans get along with animals better.

I go inside the school, and they're having some kind of open house. There are big cardboard displays of various animals and statistics about them. At one point, I see a life size standee of the demon I met earlier, complete with his statistics on torturing. It seems demons are just accepted as another part of life here. They're just doing their job.

He's sitting inside one of the classrooms, looking dejected. I ask him what's up, and he tells me he's found out that the guy he was supposed to kill for his rite of passage actually made a backdoor deal with a higher demon to make sure he stayed alive and his demon pursuer lost. I wish him good luck, and that I hope he'll be able to figure a way out of it. He seems like a nice enough guy.

The dream cuts to me at home (but the house looks nothing like ours), idly watching some Disney movie while I clean up the livingroom. In the scene, the characters are in a courtroom, and Gadget is on the witness stand! Then Gadget changes into a variety of other animals, including a dragon.

The main plot of the movie, from what I gather, is about a well-to-do British family who become so charmed by one of the maids, they let her be part of the family. She, in turn, feels sorry for one of the other servants, and they 'adopt' her too. This goes on and on until virtually all the servants are sitting around in furs and diamonds, and only four are left actually cleaning the house. Leading to the question, what happens when all the servants become family and no one's doing any work anymore? (I seem to remember looking through the TV guide and discovering the movie was called 'Of Mice And Men', but that's a totally different movie! 'Of Mice And Maids' would seem more likely.)

Then, oddly enough, it cuts to another movie. There are four cute children, wandering around a big old house, accompanied by four little gnomes and some living teddybears. They go into a room they're not allowed in, full of all sorts of bizarre knickknacks and treasures.

Suddenly, they're discovered by the Angela Lansbury-esque housekeeper. The kids go into a really adorable song that's one giant, long excuse for why they had a perfectly good reason to go in here. The oldest kid (a girl like Jenny from Oliver And Company) carefully lifts a little gold medal off the wall as she sings. I remember it had some clever lyrics and a catchy tune, but the only line I sorta remember was "Exciting, yes, really most exciting!" as sung by the youngest girl (kind of a human Cynthia Brisby).

An then I woke up suddenly with a horrible leg cramp. Aw, poo.


*****


-The Meaning Of Life

I'm reading a Stephen King novel, but seeing it as if I'm really a part of it. I'm with a group of diverse people all living together in a commune-type place. While the background is fuzzy, I get the feeling that there's been some sort of awful worldwide catastrophe and now the few survivors all have to cooperate to survive.

I'm in the kitchen area one day with a black man and his two sons, plus a youngish white guy who's a bit of a jerk. In the middle of the table is an object (either a cereal box or a pop bottle) that has miraculously survived whatever horrors have befallen the earth, and all of us know it is immeasurably rare. We all feel a strange attraction to it, but have no idea why. I've been particularly fascinated with it for a long time. I pick it up and try to figure out what its power is. The other guys laugh at me, but I try to ignore them. I put the object to my ear and listen hard. I can almost hear a faint hiss. The other men's laughter annoys me, and I try to fake an insight just to shut them up. But instead, I am hit with something real; a wracking, all-encompassing wave of pure sadness that slams into me so hard my knees buckle. They continue to laugh, thinking it's all an act, but I'm really shaken up and I know I need to find out what really happened.

Later that night, I take the object to a nerdy, bespectacled blond girl who also lives with us. She's reading a book in bed. She's kinda snippy, and we don't usually get along well, but I know she's smart and I ask her to try the same experiment I did. Just listen to the object. She's miffed I'm keeping her from the book she's reading, but she can see I'm sincere and tries it. I wait anxiously. Nothing seems to be happening. Then, suddenly, her face goes slack with an awful expression and I have to hold onto her to keep her from falling out of bed. Just from the look in her eyes, I can tell she's heard it too.

The two of us put our differences aside to examine this phenomenon. Gradually, we get more and more of our housemates to believe us too. And we also discover that whenever anyone tries the listening experiment, it causes tiny little sudden storms and earth trembles in other parts of the surrounding area.

As in a lot of my dreams, the ending is lost, but what I do remember was the big reveal. The whole world is actually a TV show. While mankind has wondered forever why life exists, I'm the one to figure it out. All we are is a holographic world created for the amusement of a higher society. Earth doesn't exist, we don't exist. It was an experiment in television; make sentient programs, create a world for them, give them a scenario, and sit back and see what they do with it.

The object, it turns out, was nothing more than a piece of trash someone left behind in the holographic chamber before it was turned on. It became incorporated into the show, and drew us all to it like a magnet. The hiss we heard was the machines working, and the sadness we felt was at the tiny bit of the truth our minds could grasp.

The girl and I are pulled out of our reality one day to find ourselves in a huge metal room. A small, unassuming man walks towards us and explains all this, and also says that this same result keeps happening with all the other sentient programs. We beg him to somehow spare our lives, let us continue existing, even if we know now we have no souls and that all our memories from before the catastrophe never happened.

He says he'll consider it.


*****


-Bats & Balls

I'm a wee lad again, and it is a dark, spooky night. I'm afraid, but of what, I'm not sure. I'm looking out my window down my street; the night is a swirling grey-blue and I'm getting more scared by the minute. Finally, I can take it no more. Somehow I pick up my room and float it down the street, to a big rocky manmade hill full of caves. It was constructed to give some endangered bats in the area a place to stay. I will myself up the hill to the very top cave, where I know all the bats are.

Inside, it's a surprisingly warm room where lots and lots of little bats are roosting. It's actually a disused research room, but a lot of the bats seem to like it more than a regular cave because there's more little nooks and crannies to curl up and hide in. The room is dark and would seem creepy to someone else, but I'm happy here and I feel safe. I know the bats are my friends.

Eventually my bat friends realize it's just me and come out of hiding. Three big fellas with plump tummies fly right up to me and hover before my face. I nuzzle them with my nose and kiss them. I love making the little bats happy!

Much later on, I had a completely different dream. I was little again, young and skinny and full of energy, and I'd just been accepted into training to be part of a youth soccer team. But this wasn't just an ordinary team; we're talking many, many years in the future, with all sortsa cool science fictiony stuff and an overall Manga influence. And several players are actually furry kids! I'm told by one of the adults on the team, a pretty lady coach, that to qualify for the team, I have to truly become part of their lifestyle. I'll live in the team's big house with everybody else, and she says I have to be totally devoted to the team's ideals of cooperation, soccer and pizza. Sounds fun!

And it is! All the other kids are cool and there's none of the military-like rigidity I'd expect from a normal sports team. It really is all about having a good time.

A week or so later, I get to participate in a game. I'm really only watching on the field, but soon I'll be included in the real action. The stadium is huge and looks very futuristic (and made out of Legos, it seemed). The game starts and I quickly realize the rules are very much changed. For one thing, I see two players kicking the ball about, but also fighting with swords and shields! Our player gets it to an orange reptile girl who does some heavy calculations in her head. Several other players gather around her, keeping the other team from interfering. It seems also that only one player from another team can cross the center line, and all goals must be scored from the opposite side of the field, meaning players have to get really creative about offense.

The math girl completes her calculations, sword-boy tosses his weapon at the ball, knocking it perfectly into place, the girl kicks, our other players scatter away from it in perfect synchronization, and the ball rockets across the field, straight towards the goal!

Unfortunately, it's a miss. But none of us seems disappointed. it was an amazing shot, and really, the most important thing here is for both teams to do their best and have fun playing.

The dream ended there, but I seem to remember scenes from a pizza party later, so maybe we won!


*****


-Sleeper Cell

I had a dream full of cute furry kids that not only could be turned easily into a story without much polishing, but that also dovetailed quite interestingly with 'Dangerous Lunatics'.

The setting is a government-run home for orphaned furry kids. There aren't too many of them there; about five 10-12ish kids (four boys, one girl) and two older, teenaged boys who've been there a lot longer. One wears a bandanna all the time and looks very military, the other is a mercurial guy who looks a bit like John Lennon. The program is run by some human scientists and they keep the kids entertained and generally keep them happy.

What they don't tell the kids is that they are actually part of a very advanced military experiment. The scientists have made some incredible discoveries about sleep. They've programmed the kids to be able to follow orders like robots while they're unconscious. Controlled sleepwalking! Their eyes are open and completely devoid of expression; just seeing like a video feed. Back at the lab, the scientists monitor them and give them instructions, but the kids can operate semi-autonomously in this state. They all have guns and army gear, and they're actually hunting down criminals and terrorists this way! Think of the implications; soldiers who get to relax all day and only fight at night when they're not even aware they're doing it!

At the end of each night the kids return and get back in their beds. In the morning, they remember nothing. All except the two teens, who have been with the program long enough they've been entrusted with the secret. One night, after a successful run, everyone returns home but the John Lennon guy decides to stay outside for a bit, just enjoying the moonlight. Soon after he's alone, these long wooden arrow/spear-things shoot out from somewhere out of sight and kill him! (Almost like a javelin gun) This bit was really gruesome. The wood things went right through him, leaving perfect little round holes.

When the scientists find out, they panic. No one was supposed to know anything about the project, so how could anyone have targeted them like this? Since the scientists really aren't evil, they tell the other kids about the experiment. They're stunned, naturally, but this leads to a resolve to find out who's targeting them and stop them.

Once again, I lose a chunk out of the middle, but I sorta half-remember a part where the scientists also show the kids that they've done even more experiments on them. They all have various cybernetic augmentations too. And, they've had their nervous systems rewired so they can turn off their pain sensors, as they demonstrate by basically performing an autopsy on one brown-furred cat boy while he watches them! They open up his stomach and there's all sorts of wires and tubes in there along with his organs. (Of course, they put him back together again afterwards.)

In the end, after more people have died, we find out that the one girl orphan is not actually an orphan at all. She's a young, polite mouse with curly hair. She admits to the others that her father's an incredibly rich and aloof businessman who put her in the program on purpose, basically to get rid of her.

But the real shock comes at the end when we find out that the girl's dad isn't just a neglectful parent, he's also using her! He had something implanted in her eyes so they'd act like video cameras, and he then sold the outgoing feed to whichever criminal organization paid the most! The girl's been the unwitting spy the whole time! When she finds this out, she actually rips both her eyes right out of their sockets!

I can only hope afterwards that our heroes found out whoever was killing them off, and that the scientists were able to fix the little mousegirl's eyes and put them back.

[Also, later on I had a disturbingly realistic dream about one of my teeth falling out. It was one of the top ones on the left side. When I looked at it, it looked all crystalline, almost like some kind of clear technological thingy. There was also another sort-of snippet about a Disney movie where Bernard and Bianca were at a tea party, fighting an evil dude in a stovepipe hat and big black mustache who had all sorts of clockwork levers and gears inside him that made him grow taller at will. Wut.]


*****


-Alex And Mahesh's Crazy Space Adventure!

Wow! I dreamed an old-school retro sci-fi novel-type story! The dream kept looping back in and out of itself chronologically, so I'll try to do my best to fudge it in places and make sense of it.

The dream starts with me walking home from junior high, and I'm in a funk. I've just been told that a huge asteroid is going to hit our town and that we all have to evacuate. Some people are just moving to other cities, but my family's been chosen to go into space in an experimental alien cultural exchange program. I run into my best friend Mahesh as he's on his way home too, and he floats the idea of maybe coming with me and my family. That'd make things much better. After all, the trip takes a few weeks to get there. However, we'd only be staying until the city was rebuilt. Maybe a couple years, tops. (Everything's all future-y here, keep in mind)

So, the day comes and off we go in a rocketship. Everything looks a lot like how space travel was imagined in the sixties, but with some Star Trek thrown in. In fact, our captain is either Worf or Optimus Prime (it changed quite a bit). Either way, he was a quiet, stern-but-compassionate member of an alien race we humans had partnered with to make all this space exploration possible. The trip to the new planet is very, very long. Thankfully though, we can still access Earth's internet from the ship, and even from the other planet!

When we arrive, we are made aware of how things on the planet work. The dominant species is a pink-furred canine-like humanoid who look really nifty but are usually pretty aloof and full of themselves in personality. Especially their leader. They're also fond of regal-looking clothing. We'll be living in a small village close by their enclosed mall-like city. We're free to partake in their culture as long as we do our best to blend in.

Also on the planet are great big bipedal shaggy bigfoot/spider things. Non-sentient and dangerous, but easily scared away.

The pink aliens also warn us not to have any contact with these foot-long worm-beings that are white with iridescent ripples. The worms are an important part of the pink aliens' economy; they are harvested for a serum they secrete. (I'm never quite sure if they eat the serum or use it medically or what, but they use a LOT of the stuff.)

The alien landscape is pretty dull and dry. The soil is off-white and the ground tends to roll into bumps that usually aren't quite big enough to be hills. Our new home is a big domed cave in one of these hillsides. You enter by crawling into a tunnel forwards til you reach a 'V' bend, then scooting over, backing up and entering the place feetfirst. It's annoying, but I get used to it quicker than the rest of my family.

After a while, I accidentally run into one of the worms. To my astonishment, I can understand it! We talk a while and I learn that the worms have their own very advanced society, and are intelligent beyond any other species on the planet. Needless to say, they are not pleased about the pink aliens killing so many of them day after day. I tell them I'll do anything possible to help them.

The next day, Mahesh and I meet after school in this mall-like pavilion inside the pink aliens' enclosed city. There are bright colors, but most of the architecture is pearly white (reminiscent of Doozer towers), with lots and lots of trapezoids used in construction, like a ziggurat. Mahesh and I, wearing these nifty one-piece spacey-kinda suits, go to our favorite store. They sell all kinds of alien music and toys; it's kind of like Spencer's gifts, actually.

Mahesh and I discuss the worms, and we end up spotting the pink aliens' leader and following him. By now it's night and we see him and some bodyguards leaving the new city and travelling through the ruins of an old one. At the entrance to a tunnel, we see a humanoid form that's the same color as the worms. It IS the worms! A bunch of them are joined together to make a guard for the gate into their city. The leader mocks the worm-man. This means the pink aliens know the worms are sentient! At least the leader does. It appears some shady deal is going on, with the leader acting haughty and the worm man bravely taking it and restraining himself from not gutting the leader with his spear.

All of a sudden, one of the big brown beasts jumps out and attacks! Everyone scrambles for a bit, not knowing what to do, and in the fracas one of my library books falls out of my backpack and catches on fire from one of the torches outside the worm city entrance. Mahesh gets the bright idea to throw the book at the beast to drive it away. He bravely rushes in and does so, and the two of us are able to escape, with me moaning, "It was a *library* book!"

Like a lot of my dreams, there's a big chunk here where more plot should go, but doesn't. Thankfully, this time there actually was a complete ending.

Over the next weeks or months or whatever, Mahesh and I keep aware of everything that's going on between the pink aliens and the worms. With us as their eyes and ears, they're learning more about their nemeses. The two species can only speak to each other when they're in worm-man form it turns out, which is really draining and they don't do it a lot. Finally, it gets to be too much and the worms decide to strike back. This is a big move for them since they've been pacifists for as long as their whole society can remember. Using their combined strength, they burrow beneath the pink aliens' enclosed city and begin causing earthquakes. Their intentions are clear: stop killing us or we'll destroy your home.

As much as I like the worms, I like the pink aliens too and don't want to see any of them die or their city destroyed. Mahesh & I go try to find the pink alien leader and get him to listen to us. While the whole city's shaking, he's walking around apparently calm, but secretly fuming inside because he can't do anything about the situation. We tell him everything we know and I tell him specifically that the worms are willing to donate their secretions which means the pink aliens can still have as much as they need and the worms won't have to die. He ignores us as long as he can stand it, but his weakness is that, while he has nothing but contempt for the worms and will do anything to deny the fact that they're smarter than he is, he's also a truly good leader to his own people. He knows if he keeps on his old stubborn path, all his people will be hurt because of it. Grudgingly, he calls all the pink aliens together.

They meet in the hugest theater I have ever seen. Every Single Resident in the whole city, all sitting together in a room so huge and crammed-full it boggles the eye. And Mahesh and I have to get on stage and convince them of what we've seen. Gulp!

Thankfully we do. The tremors stop while we speak; the worms are listening too. Mahesh and I come up with a plan that should make things a lot easier for everyone.

When the earthquakes have stopped completely, the pink aliens' leader follows me to the main entrance of the city, with all the other pink aliens following along behind him. Outside, all the worms have gathered too. Mahesh is there, bringing along our ship's captain who's been staying with us all this time and right now has no idea what's happening. We know that his species has powerful but little-used telepathic abilities. We ask him if he can use one of us as a conduit so that all the pink aliens and all the worms can finally communicate. He nods, grabs my head, and psychic beams blast out over both assembled crowds of aliens...

It works.

Months later, Mahesh and I are getting ready to leave to go back to Earth. We both kinda want to stay longer. The worms and pink aliens are both working hard towards a shaky peace, but one with great promise. Mahesh and I say our goodbyes and get back in the rocketship. Time for another very long flight.


*****


-Samantha

I'm walking home from high school one warm, beautiful Spring day, when I notice a girl on the other side of the street, also walking home. She's a brunette with very straight hair and glasses, dressed in pink and holding some folders to her chest for lack of a backpack. I'm currently a senior, and I figure she has to be a freshman, since she looks somewhere between fourteen to fifteen. I notice she's walking oddly, not quite limping, and she seems to give off other vibes of mental illness. Possibly autism.

In an effort to be friendly, I cross the street to her and try to strike up a conversation. She's very shy. Her voice is soft and she chooses her words efficiently, but by her small, warm smile I can tell she's very glad for the company. She turns out to be a very charming and smart conversationalist, even if she doesn't say much. She tells me her name's Samantha.

I end up walking with her all the way back to her house. I figure it's no problem, that I can just call my Grandpa from her place and have him pick me up, which she says is okay too. Her house turns out to be gorgeous. It takes up two lots' worth of the end of her block, most of which is an amazingly well-kept lawn with tons of flowers and ornamentation. Samantha's college-age brother and sister are there waiting for her, as is her younger brother too. They seem like a really happy, loving family. We all chat in the front yard for a bit, and they show me their pet grey squirrel, who lets me pet him.

Some of Samantha's kid brother's friends arrive, a lot of them in street hockey gear. By now it's started to drizzle just a little, and the group of kids somehow dare me to tiptoe across the bumpy areas in the street in front of the house without stepping in any puddles. They bet me a quarter I can't do it. Since I'm in a good mood and a good sport anyway, I give it a shot. I wobble my way along the stepping-stone-like flat areas with the kids laughing, probably amused to no end at getting a high school senior to do their bidding. I glance at Samantha, noticing she's hanging back, watching, with a strange smile on her face. When I look down again, I get a real surprise. "You said you'd bet me a quarter?" I ask. They're puzzled too, now. I bend over to where I've spotted four, no *five* quarters lying on the street at my feet. There's something else too; a large old gold coin still wrapped in a coin collector's plastic sheath. It seems far too bizarre to be just a coincidence.

I don't have much time to think about it though, as the rain starts to pick up, the clouds grow dark and a bullying wind starts to blow. The kids all scatter for their houses and Samantha and her family, plus me, dart inside. In the livingroom I meet Samantha's mom and dad, plus her uncle. They're all very nice. And the house is like something out of a dream; there are wonderful little knickknacks and decorations everywhere. But it doesn't feel at all pretentious; quite the opposite. Everything gives off a feeling of welcoming coziness, as if from a past era that only exists as a fantasy.

Still, I feel uneasy. Mostly because the ferocious winds outside seem to be getting worse by the second. I ask Samantha's mom if I can call my Grandfather, but outside we see that some of the phone lines have already gone down! It's clear now what's happening. We've been caught up in a sudden tornado, or hurricane. There was no way any of us could prepare.

Outside I see debris flying, tree limbs falling, and roof shingles being peeled off. Samantha is sitting on the couch, rocking back and forth and counting obsessively. "1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4, 1 2 3 4..." Her parents are holding each other and crying. I stop where I am and look around, having a bizarrely calming moment of clarity. I am in the clutch of the greatest sense of deja vu I've ever felt in my life. "I feel like I know everything that's about to happen. This room, Samantha counting, all of it..."

So I'm ready for it when it happens. The tornado has already destroyed several nearby houses, and now it picks up Samantha's. We feel the lurch as the house is ripped from the foundations and carried up into the air, spinning in circles. We are all about to die, but I still feel surreally calm.

And then everything stops.

I look out the windows at absolute nothingness. Even the other rooms of the house are nothing but smoky grey outlines. Samantha is still on the couch, bent over silently. Everyone else but her and me has vanished.

I go over and sit down beside her, hugging her gently. "Samantha... You're keeping us safe now, aren't you?" A tiny, barely perceptible nod. "You did that trick with the coins, too." Another nod.

I know nothing of this girl. I met her just barely an hour ago. Yet somehow I know exactly what needs to be done. I gently coax Samantha into standing up. "This is important, Samantha; keep your eyes closed." I have a feeling that she is keeping us alive instinctually, and that if she comes face-to face with the reality of the swirling void outside, the horror will snap her concentration instantly.

"Now, I need you to picture the rest of the house. Can you do that? Picture all the rooms in the most detail you possibly can. _Believe_ in them. Okay, let's start with the kitchen first."

I lead her around the house. Very slowly, mindful of her funny walk. I am terrified, but numb on the surface; this is simply too important to feel fear now. As I point Samantha towards the colorless, transparent space where her kitchen used to be, I see colors start pouring in and within a few seconds its back in existence. "That's it, Samantha! Perfect! "Now come over here and let's do... Is this your parent's bedroom? Picture that now."

We go from room to room. I am nearly delirious from pent-up energy, but I keep my voice calm. Samantha, still with her eyes closed like a good girl, methodically wills each room of her house back into existence. I keep glancing up at the windows, but the emptiness is still there. We're not safe yet. "This looks like your brother or your sister's room. Believe in that now. And is this where you're uncle's staying?"

Finally the whole house is restored, and the view outside changes to the aftermath of what must have been an unimaginably vast tornado. We're still way up in the air though. I stand in front of Samantha and hold her by the shoulders. "Now comes the last part, Samantha. Are you ready?"

She nods.

I blank out.

The next thing I know, I'm standing in the same spot I was when the tornado hit. Her parents are back where they were, so is the rest of the family, and the house is on solid ground again. I run to the windows, and everywhere is devastation. There's not a single unscathed house on the street. Except for this one. I have a feeling if I looked outside, the house would look exactly as it did before the tornado.

I wonder now if Grandpa is okay and if the tornado went anywhere near his house. But that's a worry for later. Right now all I can do is look at Samantha, and know that somehow I'm only alive right now because of her...


*****


-Rise Of Alex Reynard

I and seven friends are hanging out in an old, abandoned carnival. That is, we think it's abandoned. We check out one of the still-standing midway games; a shooting gallery, and look around in the back of it. But then the walls open up and catch all my friends in a trap! It pulls them all into an underground area. Luckily, I escape and follow after them.

I discover a secret underground lab where military guys and scientists are walking around amongst *living cartoons*! It's straight outta Roger Rabbit! In a big, open room full of dubious but colorful equipment, I see through a window this huge rift: the scientists have found a hole to another dimension that secretes 'toonstuff': It's a black gooey substance that looks like ink (naturally) and has the same texture as mercury. The scientists can craft pure toons out of the stuff, or feed it to a human being and turn them into one. Either way, the toons need more of the stuff to continue to survive, and the government controls the only supply, so they have to work as slaves.

I know there has to be a way for me to get my hands on the stuff, drink as much as I can, and become Alex Reynard to free my friends. I find a small can of toonstuff, jam my hand into it, and out comes a toon glove clutching a toon gun. I order the scientists to go get me more. They say toon bullets can't hurt people. I shoot out a window. "Yes, but shrapnel can."

I take a hostage, a small chubby boy 12 or 13ish, and order the rest to go get me what I want. I promise him I have no intention of hurting him. He's so jaded, he doesn't seem to mind much. Then he turns and starts advancing on me! But he's crying and acting like he doesn't want to do it. I'm suddenly aware that the head of the whole project (a slick-haired, beak-nosed evil man in a pinstriped suit) somehow has the power to force his will upon others. To keep both me and the boy safe, I take a risk. I reach 'offscreen' (behind a table) and pull out ...a toon pencil! I tell the kid to use all his willpower to just stand still for a second. Then I quickly sketch a cage over his head. Realizing the bars are too skinny, I replace the pencil with a magic marker, draw a better cage, and let it fall on him. Then I put a big, black cartoon weight on top of it to make sure.

I finally get enough toonstuff to transform me into my foxy alter ego. My experience with the toon pencil has taught me that the toonstuff reacts to pure will: if you believe it, you can do it. For a brief, shining instant, I become like a god; flying around the lab shootin' bigass energy balls from my hands. Awesome.

But the military guys in the lab are too much for me. I escape through an evil-looking black hatch in the main room and wind up deep in the bowels of the laboratory's machine innerworkings. Unfortunately, I end up trapped there...

Cut to about a decade later. I've gone dormant now, most of my consciousness is asleep, but I'm still travelling around like a slime blob looking for a way out. I finally find a crack in my prison and ooze out. I slowly awaken. I'm in a toy store ...in a mall? They've built over the lab completely, and I see bland-looking toon workers everywhere. The scientists have found a way to create them without a will of their own, so now they happily do slave work. The more I look around, the more I realize that with the toon slaves doing everything, life is now statistically perfect, but has lost much of its soul. Well, this little fox is doing something about it! Even after ten years, my will is still titanium-strong. I believe with all my might that I have super strength and speed, and burrow through the floor back into the guts of the lab.

I find a huge underground toonstuff mining operation. Locating a storage tank as big as a water tower, I jump in, get out a straw, and will the stuff to taste like Dr. Pepper. With one giant slurp, it's all gone. I go into the next tank and decide to create a friend to help me. Pulling a toon pencil from a body pocket, I sketch Fifi LaFume on the air itself. She moves, groggily, and I tell her to just relax and drink as much as she can. I hand her the straw. As she drinks, depth and color spread throughout her, like watching a circulatory system becoming visible. When she finishes off the giant tank, she is fully alive, purple and beautiful. I have willed her all of my memories of her: she knows just who she is, who I am and what we have to do now. We must find out where my seven friends are, since they were undoubtedly turned into toon slaves long ago.

Hand in hand, we go make the world right again.


*****


-My Own Battle Royale

The dream was very much like Battle Royale without actually being Battle Royale.

I'm a teenager (the dream actually had its own manga cover art, and my last name was Hayabusa) living in a totalitarian Japan of the future. It's horribly overcrowded and everyone must wear black at all times. I'm walking through a market when The TV announces the story of a teenage girl who wrote a letter of protest to the government, and was then executed for it. Seeing her face, and her courage, makes me fall in love with her.

Months later, my whole high school student body has been taken to an enormous posh resort for something all schools do at the end of every year. We students spend the day enjoying great food, recreation and other loosened restrictions, but when night comes, it's time for the game.

They line us up before four doors, according to grade. The rules are this: We all have katanas. We must all strike to kill. Alliances are illegal. Anyone who survives the night wins. I am determined to end this game, even if they kill me for it. I have been practicing defensive moves all year; they cannot make me kill.

When the bell rings, we all surge through the doors into the resort and begin fighting. Others scramble for hiding spots, but there's not a single door in the place with locks that will work now. I fight my way through the crowd, literally, deflecting blows and calmly trying to talk my opponents out of this craziness.

When the teachers realize I won't fight to kill, they start coming after me. Impeding a teacher is against the rules, but I don't care. The first one is a big, ugly gym teacher. He is a tough and brutal opponent. I warn him I will cut off his hand if he doesn't leave me alone, and then I do.

I continue to try and seek out friends, hide when I can and most of all talk people out of this. I make sure my strikes are non-lethal, but will also not harm them enough to make them sitting ducks for the other players. The next teacher who tries to stop me, it nearly breaks my heart to fight her. She is a tall, beautiful nurse who has a kind heart. While clashing swords with her, I beg her to reconsider. She begs me to follow the law, otherwise more people will die. I know they will, but at least those deaths will be our own choice. I warn her if she does not back down, I will start taking fingers until she does. Then I do. I have to take two from her left hand before she runs away, crying.

I lost a lot of the bulk of the dream; mostly it was skulking around, finding hiding places and having more run-ins with fellow students, some of whom were making out rather than fighting. Good for them. Also, a girl jumped me in the snowy lot behind the resort, and I ducked under her swing to give her side a warning slash.

I make it to dawn, and bring many other students over to my side, but not nearly as many as I'd wanted. Somehow, I manage to escape the resort and find myself back in the same marketplace where I'd seen the news report about the girl protestor. The school officials are chasing after me, but an old, fragile-looking man in big glasses runs in front of them, waving his arms. I take the opportunity to hide behind some garbage cans and listen. The glasses-man tells the school officials to please stop this insanity, that the game was originally supposed to be nothing more than a big food fight to pump the students up in celebration of finishing another year. But as the population rose, the government slowly turned it into the bloodbath it is today. "Why should we listen to such crazy stories?" the officials say. "Because I'm the man who wrote that law," the glasses-man says sorrowfully.

In the end, I am caught and sentenced to be executed. I do not mind. I hope that my actions will inspire others to stand in defiance too. My last request is to be killed in the same electric chair that the girl protestor was also killed in. As I sit down, I feel a connection. I realize this has all been a love story between two people who had never met, and that my own actions were made to honor hers. With my last moments, I hope someone will choose to honor my actions too.


*****


-Sundown

I'm the star of an absolutely colossal big-budget sci-fi epic. Yet another apocalyptic dream with terrifyingly real visuals and a sense of fear and dread that lasted long after waking.

I'm a young teen, but blazingly smart. I have an older sister and younger brother. Our parents run a large party story in a big city and we live just above it. The night before, I've had a dream that aliens came to take over the world by blotting out our sun.

The whole day, I've been uneasy, but my siblings tell me it was just a dream. Then, it happens. I hear screams. When I run outside, what had been a sunny summer day is now pitch black. The darkness is so utterly complete it's almost incomprehensible. I tell my sister this is what I dreamed, only my mind couldn't picture it as bad as it really is. I also know, without knowing how I know, that I and my siblings are destined to save humanity. There is a huge alien armada in orbit around us, and they have a machine that can completely encircle the planet and cut off all light. Whether they intend to kill us or drive us crazy, I don't know but I can't help but wonder how long it would take without sunlight for all life on Earth to die.

Just as I'm gathering flashlights, cameras and food for the three of us to go out and explore the darkness, it ends. The sun comes back. People begin to relax, thinking it was just some fluke astronomical phenomenon. But I know better.

Hours later, I'm trying to find my siblings again to try to get them to believe me. Our store has tall glass walls and a caf� area past the selling floor. It's just about sunset and the sky is orange but the building lights are coming on. And then it happens again. People shriek as the light simply cuts off, like a giant eyelid had simply closed over the whole planet.

Then I see something that I instinctually hate, yet don't yet know why; a massive red, swirling spot, looking hideously like a boiling eye, slides across the sky from horizon to horizon. It is so huge, it must be the size of an entire country. The other people are stunned silent, but I cry out, cursing the intelligence I know is behind this. As if it heard me, a *swarm* of red eyespots float across the sky, torturously silent, looking like coral, or a fractal, or an infection. I realize the full implications that the survival of all life on Earth depends on me now. If I don't act now, everything dies. I begin my journey.

This last part with the eyespot was the single most striking image of the dream, but there were other parts after it; me and my siblings joining up with some marines and preparing to join them on a helicopter mission. Also; tracking the aliens' leader to an installation in the middle of nowhere, since the sun-blocker needs a component on Earth to work. The leader has a secret entrance through a series of six industrial-looking vents, only one of which leads to a safe landing; the others bring death by fire or shredding. The leader challenges an unloyal flunky to guess which vent it is; the flunky chooses poorly. And somehow I have to choose the right one and follow him. Shit.

After waking, other ideas came to me: the Aliens are reptilian, and always wear stormtrooper-like armor that covers their entire bodies. I 'know' that they have done this blot-out-the-sun attack to many other worlds. Our planet is the right distance from the sun, but our atmosphere is unbreathable, so they are going to kill off all life and 'terraform' the planet to their liking. When my siblings and I reach the military base, I tell the soldier out front I need to see his commanding officer and that I have advance knowledge about the alien invasion. When he scoffs at that, I tell him, "I found this place, didn't I?" Later, I follow the alien leader to a place where he is giving a big speech and I hide underneath the podium. As he speaks, I realize that I must kill him. No hostage situation; I must use shock to my advantage and murder him cruelly in front of his people. Summoning my courage, I do. Then I tell the aliens that their plan has failed. At that time, I have the marines hit the aliens' installation with everything they have, obliterating it. I tell the aliens that if a mere child of the human race can so thoroughly defeat a plan that has worked on dozens of other worlds, in less than a single day, then maybe they should consider what ALL of humanity can do to them. I tell them to leave and never come back. Since their greatest weapon was always fear, they're halfway defeated just because we know of their existence. They begin retreat, and take me away to be executed. I knew this would happen. Heroes never really survive. But then I black out...

I wake up what feels like days later, to see my sister and brother sitting beside two tall, thin aliens with red eyes and skin like blue tree bark. I ready myself to kill them to protect my siblings, but they calm me down. They tell me that it was them who gave me all the knowledge I needed to defeat the other aliens and save my planet. The same thing had happened to their world long ago, and since then they'd been using remote telepathy to try to help other species repel the invaders. (Which is partly why the aliens retreated so easily; this had already happened before and seeing it play out again scared them shitless.) I thank them for their help, on behalf of all life on Earth.

*****

-Moon Movie


I dreamed an action/comedy/drama starring myself as an astronaut in the future. I'm very talented at my job, but a snafu on my first space flight results in the shuttle destroying itself on the launchpad. The rockets fire just for a second, long enough to make the whole thing 'jump' off the platform and crash on its side. No one is hurt, but it does cost a severely large amount of money.

Years later, NASA's finally letting me prove myself again. This is the future, so the space program's a bit different. We have a permanent moon base, so shuttles can launch from Earth or the moon. A week earlier, the largest shuttle was coming home from a mission when all contact with it was lost. By now the two astronauts on board are presumed long dead, but that's not the real problem. The problem is that the shuttle is due to re-enter the atmosphere soon, and will hit Earth dead center in a populous city, essentially becoming a massively destructive bomb. My job is to pilot a smaller shuttle from the moon, plant explosives on the big shuttle, and then NASA can detonate it. If I fail, plan B is to simply shoot it down with a barrage of missiles from the moon (whose normal purpose is in case of meteors). I am assigned a team of young and eager fellow astronauts; two of whom will ride with me in the shuttle and help me with the explosives.

Things become complicated, however. I receive some kind of transmission indicating that one of the astronauts on the big shuttle is still alive! I tell NASA and beg them to send up a rescue shuttle. They insist there's no time, and they don't believe it's possible the other astronaut is alive anyway. I know what I heard though. And even though I have no connection to the man, he's still a human being. I can't bear the thought of him alone in the cold of space, starving and dehydrated, and when finally someone seems to come to his rescue, instead they burn him alive.

My duty is clear: We have to steal the space shuttle.

I assign one of my crew (an attractive young lady. Natch. This IS a movie.) to ride with me, leaving the third seat empty for the other astronaut. The others, I send into mission control to hijack the room and force the launch crew at gunpoint to follow my orders. I and the lady fight past security to get on board the shuttle and off we go. On Earth, NASA is in an uproar. Halfway through our crazy flight, they make the decision to launch the missiles anyway, hoping that will force us to abort our mission.

Instead, it just means we have to speed it up. We reach the big shuttle and discover an unexpected snag. While the one astronaut is alive and has managed to ration out water for himself to stave off dehydration, the *other* astronaut is alive too. The first one put him into a coma to save resources. We're one seat short. As the missiles fire from the moon and we can see them streaking slowly towards us, I tell the lady astronaut to pilot the shuttle home. I'm giving up my seat. She says she can't let me make that sacrifice. And then I realize; I don't have to.

With bare moments to spare, I tether myself to the outside of the shuttle and we blast away from the big shuttle, as fast as we can. I'm dragged along like a ragdoll. I can see the explosion behind me and it is unimaginably spectacular.

Since there's no atmosphere on the moon, I'm in no danger of frying up on reentry. We land safely and all it takes for us to be forgiven for our little theft is the sight of the other two astronauts emerging from our shuttle.


*****


-Hotel Heist

I'm a professional British thief, of the methodically-planned heist kind. My current target is held within the most secure hotel in the world. Famous people stay there regularly and it has state-of-the-art security systems.

I'm not just a master thief but a teacher. My team is made up of college-age, brilliant young minds eager to learn the secrets of thievery.

Today is the final exam' of sorts for one of my students; a normally-meek brunette girl. The building has many floors and we enter from the top. I know who has our target, but not exactly where they're staying. Our plan today has a great deal of spontaneity to it, since the security measures here are so technically superior, the best way to get past them is to just walk in, be confusing, and get out quickly.

The building looks like it was designed by Macintosh: lots of gleaming white and chrome everywhere with crystal blue trim. Lots of balconies and open areas. We travel down the main staircase, briefly checking each floor. We're walking around in plain sight, since there's no way we could pull off this heist without revealing our identities anyway, which means we may as well not bother. Although I think I have a mustache.

Finally, I spot it. This floor looks different as soon as we set foot on it. It's much wider, with one huge main suite to our left. This is where we want to be. I have kept my assistant in the dark about much of our plan today, but now explain that this suite is the semi-permanent residence of a very famous female singer, and she has something we want. As we approach the room, I tell her that there is no actual door; the doorway is protected by a laser shield, like a forcefield. I tell her to pretend to be a fan and lie her way in there, then when the door' opens again to let her out, I'll dash in with a gun.

The plan works beautifully. I'm well aware that this singer is known for being very accommodating with her fans, and my assistant's very unpreparedness makes her sound like a real, starstruck fan. The two of us together never would have been able to get through. When she goes in, the guard at the door follows her in to ensure nothing happens. I get in position in front of the door. I can see down the L-shaped hallway another guard leading my assistant back. The laser shield flickers for a nerve-wrackingly-long time, then drops. I'm in.

I swoop in, waving my gun around and talking wildly. I toss a gun to my assistant too. The singer (who looks like Janet Jackson) has her three kids in here, so I make a point of telling everyone that I have no plans whatsoever to hurt them. In fact, the kids don't seem scared of me at all.

The singer is lounging on a couch in the front room. I turn to her and tell her that I know her family deals in archaeological artifacts and that they use her touring schedule sometimes to move artifacts around. I tell her I know all about the shipment from Germany and there is one piece I need. Leaving my assistant to keep the two guards where they are, I follow the singer through the suite to a side room. Far from scared, she seems very bitter, as if knowing this was going to happen to the artifacts.

We go into a room full of shelves, upon which rest rows and rows of pots, boxes, statues and other antiquities. The Germans had dug these up in the Middle East. The singer walks to the end of the room where the jewels and gold are, assuming that's what I'm after. But she's surprised when I stop by a small, crumbling wooden box on the lowest shelf. There is a brightly painted scene of a king and his kingdom on top. The bottom of the box is rotting away and a piece nearly falls off as I pick it up. It's also obvious that this box looks nothing like the rest of the collection. I let the singer know I got what I came for and I'll be off now. She seems genuinely baffled that all I wanted was a cruddy box and is glad to see me go.

Gathering my assistant, we go to a specific window in the suite. We can see four metal cables, with nozzle-like things on the ends, hanging down outside. Our guns have bullets chosen specifically for shooting through thick glass and we knock the window out with a few shots. When I can reach the cables, I finally explain to my assistant what they are. I tell her to attach one of the nozzles' to the front of her belt. This is our escape. As soon as they're secured, we jump out of the window together, holding onto the two extra cables for stability. They're attached to a helicopter! With our target acquired, we fly off.

Our temporary HQ is nearby. The helicopter pilot sets us down very gently and we disengage. My other students are waiting for us and they cheer. There's even some reporters; our group are basically good guy' thieves, recovering important artifacts and getting them back to where they rightfully belong. We're quite popular worldwide.

Finally when we're all settled in, I explain to my students what this was all about. I show them the box and explain that it used to contain a map to a literal king's fortune in treasure. But since the map is long gone, why go to all that trouble to steal an empty box then? Because the map inside was a fake; designed to lure thieves to a second site full of nothing. The painting on the lid of the box is the REAL map! All we have to do is follow it. A new adventure awaits us.

I really liked this dream. It was fun, linear and had a surprisingly plausible plot to it.




*****


-Snippets

*I'm on a guided tour of these incredibly blue underwater caves. They are huge and claustrophobic at the same time, and so detailed it's impossible to describe them. I'm amazed we can fit through some of the really tight places. but eventually we reach the surface to see the sunrise.

*I'm at a wild Halloween party with a lot of my friends in a haunted house of pancakes at the end of a strip mall late at night. I wander around, several people recognize me, I make my way upstairs. Suddenly, all the sound stops and I know everyone else has vanished. I realize that also in the room is Denis Leary, who stays remarkably in-character and believable through the whole dream, even telling me how we're all gonna die as he nervously flicks his lighter with a cig in his mouth. I am really scared, but nevertheless keeping my head. I know I could be killed at any moment, so I decide to very cautiously make a beeline for the front door. I get downstairs and everything seems fine. I'm in the living room, which looks a lot like the Addams' Family place. I blink, and immediately the place is FILLED with hideous ghouls! Without thinking, I bolt for the door and out into the black, rain-slicked parking lot.

*I'm going to high school with Ben Affleck. Not too much of a plot. It does seem to be way far in the future and our class is on some odd assignment in another dimension. Ben is the same guy as he always is, even starring in movies all the time; he just happens to also go to the same school as me. He's a really nice guy to be around, too.

*Extremely fragmented, heavily Star Wars based dream splinters. Very striking and extremely detailed visuals. Here's my notes written just after waking up: Huge waterfall. C3PO done up in Egyptian Turquoise. Queen Amidala in golden 3-wheel C3PO style. She transforms into a hand fan and I can't seem to get her to change back - bird part. Accidentally in the lair of Boba Fett. 'An unremarkable man'. Incredibly detailed cardboard and plastic Star Wars models at a big flea market: Boba Fett bust, ship deck. Video game involving spinning sphere. neat Lego set of big bug that becomes four small vehicles. Living alone and letting plump, lazy girl stay over

*I'm driving an enormous maroon Cadillac that can become non-corporeal. There's a big celebration going on at Buckingham Palace and I drive around through (literally, through) the place freaking people out. Close to being lucid and lots of sensation, especially movement.

*I'm walking to Blockbuster video to rent something on a warm, still early summer evening. I'm a few blocks from the place when a cute little bat swoops down in front of me and starts to dart back and forth in front of me! The little fellow is really adorable. I can see every detail of his wings and fur perfectly. I put out my finger, knowing somehow he'll come in to land on it. I'm delighted when he does. I can really feel his little footclaws clutching my finger! He looks up at me with a happy little face. I gently cup him in my hand. He's unused to being held on his tummy and fidgets a bit. I pet his fur softly and he calms down. I go into the video store (which is full of unopened boxes of movies, mostly) and the clerk, seeing the bat, without batting an eye, immediately points out where the nature section is!

*Small part of a larger dream that seems to involve the Tiny Toons. Something or other is draining their colors out and turning everything a dull off-white. The adults seem to think this is a good thing and scold the toons for trying to oppose the change. The toons try to hide at all costs any spark of color they've managed to keep. However, somehow the colors are then able to change into tiny human-shaped toonish beings. At first they fight among themselves, (I remember sparkling silver and gold color-things particularly) but then they see reason and merge to combat the colorlessness. Then there's a long part where the Tiny Toons have to lead the color beings across a wide busy highway, in tight military formations. Somehow this was important.

* Some horrific catastrophe has completely and permanently wiped out electric power to the entire world. I'm Jim Carrey and I used to have a bigass mansion and a nice touring RV, but when the power went out I was such a weakling, I was easily overpowered by looters and my stuff stolen by some ruthless dickhead. After spending some time on the chaotic streets, I find there's going to be a meeting at my former mansion, held by the thieving dickhead. The front driveway is packed with all sortsa cars, most are big ones like RVs and station wagons, since a lot of people live in their vehicles now. Also, a lot of the cars are very weird looking, and quasi-50s styled. Since it's my place, I manage to sneak in and do some reconnaissance. The dickhead's emerging as a new leader among the various people still with vehicles and possessions. I snoop a bit, then head back outside and steal back my RV! Later that night, I'm dreaming that I've made it to some rural part of the country where a lot of people in a big wooden house have managed to squeeze out a peaceful living. I join in with them. It's still a dangerous world, as evidenced by the several times someone comes close to serious injury and how everyone is instantly alert to any sounds that aren't right, but all things considered, it's the best we can hope for. There's a part with me and a new friend trying and failing to sing a duet of some 80s song while sitting on the livingroom windowsills. Another part where a woman and I were going to drive to town for supplies.

*I'm showing off the elementary school I used to go to to my Grandpa. Only it's not my real school; it's some enormous place with architecture right out of a Sonic level. Lots of pink/blue/purple/green checkerboard patterns, arches, zigzags, high ceilings and decorative red globes. There's a part of the school with one of those big play places with all the tubes kids can crawl through. At the end of a slide is a big ball pit. Niftily enough, Sonic and Tails show up then. They seemed to be being chased through the tubes by some school bullies and they managed to fend them off in the ball pit.

*Some scientists are working on an animal/human hybrid project. Somehow some germsorwhatever get loose and infect a nearby high school. Mine, by chance. The airborne stuff turns some kids into furries, lucky me amongst them. I'm an anthro fox now! Yay! The transformed kids are running around displaying their new attributes. I find I'm much sleeker and more agile. At one point I'm running up the stairs singing "Let The Bodies Hit The Floor". I see a (non-anthro) squirrel sitting placidly on one of the steps who seems completely unafraid of humans. A female friend explains why, something about a long story involving squirrels 'doing it' in the school fountain or something. Some jumbled stuff happens and it's over.

*Grandpa and I are coming home from a long, long road trip with some school friends of mine in the car with us. At a stoplight, a guy looking like Artie Lange asks if we can take on some giraffes with us; they're going to pennsylvania. Gramps says sure and we both pull over and stop. I was expecting anthro giraffe girls, but these are more like toony giraffes, and they're midgets!

*I'm driving with some unseen friends to see Spiderman 2. The movie opens on Dr. Octopus' lair, with a whole bunch of skinny, nervous henchmen sitting on benches waiting for their boss to give them orders. He's devised some serum that will give humans all the kickass genes of certain deadly animals. He has a special vial each for a cobra, copperhead and a tarantula. He picks three henchmen at random (me being amongst them) and order them to drink the stuff, after he mixes it into a little ice cream sundae cup (sure, why not?). We drink up, then try to remember who got what serum before we start transforming.

*I've gone to the zoo with the whole family and Mahesh. The zoo's a lot bigger, it's summer and the place is packed. We're all at a picnic bench and this bizarre enormous animal is walked by a zoo guy right past us. It's like a turtle the size of a rhino with a semi-spherical body and slick, black, almost aerodynamic skin over all of itself (think if a Golem from Pokemon walked on all fours. Sorta.) Later, Mahesh and I get to see sort of a parade where we sit in the grass and get to watch as all sorts of animals are walked past us to another part of the zoo. We see a bunch of the black cannonball turtle things, as well as some midget elephants (about the size of a pony) who are very cute and friendly. We get split up for a bit, and when I go to find Mahesh, we see that the ground behind the parade is now littered with dozens of animal turds! Bleah! We tiptoe cautiously. As we continue walking, we keep running into this bratty bully kid. He's really doing his best to piss us off, but we can't do anything because he's much younger than us. We try to lose him in the bat house. Up at the front, I see some *tiny* bats and I am paralyzed by cuteness. The li'l guys are about as big as a fingertip and they're all adorable! I wanna take them all home! But when I get out of the bat house, I see Mahesh up ahead, and he looks like a wreck. This woman says her son is the kid who's been tormenting us, and he was beatin' on Mahesh some. She says she knows her kid's an asshole and slyly suggests to me that she wished 'someone' would teach him a lesson. Woohoo! Free reign to find the little fucker and go medieval on his ass!

*I'm living in a world where some streets have somehow turned into several hundred feet deep fissures in the ground. Everyone just kinda deals with it like that.

*I'm Buster Bunny, and apparently I'm in trouble. It's night, I'm in Bugs' car and he's driving me around, trying to find a safe place to stay the night. Bugs pulls up at one house in the suburbs. I get out and hop up to the door. To my surprise, the door is answered by another Bugs! What's going on? Then I notice the dopey look on Bugs' face. I reach out and pull off the mask to reveal Elmyra. She giggles in her usual annoying way. I have an idea on how to get rid of her. I suggest we play a game where she has to copy everything I do. She readily agrees. We go through some motions, then I make my hand into a fist and pull it waaay back. She does the same. I say into the camera "Kids, you might not wanna watch this part. I'm not very proud of it." Then, before she can react, I just haul back and punch her in the face with a loud accompanying sound effect!

*I'm playing Tomb Raider, oddly enough, and I seem to be doing really good at it. Later on in the dream, I'm doing terrible things to a hamster and I have a ray gun that can destroy buildings. Fucked up.

*I'm reading a furry story about a guy who brings a vixen and (not sure) a dragoness to an abandoned house to do evil stuff to them. Little does he know the house is inhabited by a green slime demon. It possesses the girls, but in a yiffy way they like, and they plan to get back at the guy that brought them there.

*I'm part of a team of wannabe super heroes (a lot like Mystery Men). We all have powers, but they're only somewhat more impressive than what a normal person can do. For instance, one of us is a speedster, like the Flash, but he can only go two, three times tops as fast as the average guy. There was also a strong guy, and three others I don't remember. We're fighting evil teenage hooligans in a high school classroom at the moment. In true Gen-X fashion, a lot of the kids just sit there and keep studying while we're kicking butts and smashing stuff. Eventually we manage to save the day. Later, we're relaxing in a local restaurant, when a couple comes in. The woman is angrily berating her inattentive boyfriend. I overhear the conversation and am surprised at how the woman (who might have been Joan Cusack) is able to recall dozens of specific details about her day. I talk to her a little later and she tells me she has a near-perfect memory, of everything that happens to her. I excitedly tell her that maybe she can be a part of our team, since a superhero group can always use a big brain. She seems a bit flustered by the thought, but kind of excited too, like she's never really seen her ability as all that special.

*I was riding in the Sea Duck, and we were on the lookout for Gadget and Baloo on a water-bicycle she invented.

*I lost most of a dream that seemed to have had a lot of plot to it. It centered around a guy who slowly came to believe that the government was turning some people into semi-androids, meaning they were given an injection and it made them controllable and changed some of their insides. It was interesting how the guy tried his best to be reasonable about it and only really believed it when all the evidence pointed to it. Also, the movie was sly about making it so the audience is never truly sure if the guy's just insane. At the end, the guy finds out the evil doctors are trying to roboticize his wife. He bursts in on them with a gun, only to find they've just injected his wife. He goes berserk and shoots them, but one bullet rips straight through one of their bodies and hits his wife, killing her. As he kneels down, crying, he realizes the house is surrounded by government guys. He's apparently fucked, and the movie end there. But then it skips to the sequel. It starts precisely where the first left off. The guy finds strength in his anger and goes ballistic on the agents. He makes it out of the house and into his car. There's a great car chase with him just barely staying ahead of them; no finesse, all force. He makes it to this warehouse place and starts setting up motion-sensors that will trigger rifles. The dream got stuck on this part and kept repeating it, adding more and more details until it just got silly.

*I've been staying at a friend's place for a while. I wake up to the alarm going off. I try to turn it off, but it won't work. I yank out the batteries, pull the plug, nothing! I even pull the plug on the radio. I beat the shit out of the alarm clock, but it still continues to shriek. I run to Justin, but he doesn't know what's going on either. (Then, of course, I realize I have to wake up first) Other stuff happens. At some point we catch a cute fox and we put him in a big cage. He seems quite happy to have been caught, even excited. 'Oh boy, I'm in a cage!'. Then I start to see more foxes around the place. Has ours invited friends over?

*I had a Sonic dream. In the dream, Dr. Robotnik had taken Tails and roboticized him. Sonic saw the whole thing and barely escaped with his life. At first he's so depressed he considers just giving up entirely. But then he remembers that Bunnie's still captured and that he may be able to save her. He rushes back across a vine footbridge stretched across a giant, gaping sinkhole. At Robotnik's place, Sonic pretends to surrender and agrees to let Robotnik roboticize him. He's sure that if Uncle Chuck could get back his free will, he can too. Robotnik wants to copy Sonic's brain patterns first, so Sonic has to sit in the chair and watch as his whole memory is transcribed onto a series of CDs. Bunnie and Sally are captured in the roboticization chamber too, and they fret over Sonic, who does his best to reassure them without giving away his plan. I woke up before the end of it, but I'm sure Sonic's plan worked and he got back Tails too.

*Small excerpt at the end of a longer dream: I'm a teenage skunk boy going to an all-furry school. Fifi LaFume is also a student, and she and I are boyfriend & girlfriend. After the last day of school lets out, we go to the edge of the playground to where there's an interesting little natural 'staircase' formed by tree roots. This is where we run a little religious club. [What? Me, religious?] Fifi's the driving force behind it; I'm along mostly because I love her, but I believe in it too. We've got all sorts of papers and stuff tacked up on the little staircase, which we refer to, oddly enough as 'the Jesus run'. We're standing around, handing out pamphlets, trying to get people interested in the club. Thankfully, we take a more relaxed religious view of things; we're not all fire 'n brimstone. After most of the students clear out, we sit on the playground equipment and chat about stuff; how the club's going, what we'll do over the summer. I play a bit on one part of the playground structure. Later that night, I go to a 'Monster Party' (there was a pun about that, but I can't remember it now) with most of the other students, a live band, and a whole lot of party food. I scope out a plate of fudge brownies. I think Elmyra was there too. That's about it.

*A dream focused on Fievel from An American Tail. There's been a lot of bullies in his neighborhood, so he's created this big elaborate dragon suit that he puts on to scare the bullies. It seems to be working. His friends realize that the dragon leaves them alone, so it mush have some connection with Fievel. He even lets some of his friends ride on the dragon as he flies around the city. (Pretty impressive that Fievel can fly with wooden wings.) Lastly, there's a bit with Fievel being interviewed on some late night news talk show.

*I'm in some kind of a school setting (most of the rest of the dream is lost) and they have a little selection of gift stuff to buy for Christmas. I notice a new Rescue Ranger cartoon, with Gadget, Dale and Foxglove on the box! It looks to be some kind of romantic holiday plot, with Foxy trying to get snuggly with Dale. The animation style is interesting too; more like fanart, and colored by computer like a lot of shows nowadays. Later on, I'm watching a cartoon where the old-school Chip and Dale are fighting in World War Two as saboteurs. They've infiltrated a Japanese camp and are trying to avoid all the human feet. They have to get to a dock down the coast where an immense German battleship is. Their mission is to get on board and disable it. The cartoon had a neat style with animated characters over real model sets, like an old Fleisher cartoon.

*I dreamed an animated adventure movie about squirrels. The main character is an extremely Tammy-like teen skwrlgirl. Her father's a famous explorer and he's been lost in a treacherous mountain range for almost a year now. Her family makes the decision to go off and find him. I remember one part where she's describing all the gear they've gotten for the trip, then their handsome hunky skwrlboy assistant shows up, she goes speechless for a second, then says he's 'Squirrelicious!'. The family flies off to the mountains and eventually discovers the father trapped in a Shangri-La like place. There are strange playful godlike beings there, and they delight in playing with the dad squirrel, turning his fantasies to reality, and sometimes their own. Of course, I've lost a lot of details, but this was too cute an idea to let go!

*At first, I'm watching an episode of Star Trek Next Gen, where the Enterprise is at war with some aliens in really huge ships that look like they're made out of stacked white cubes. There are two starfleet guys manning one of the Enterprise's weapons stations; a reptile guy and another alien who looks like a white-rubber covered mouse. He has very smooth and shiny skin and dinnerplate-like ears. As the ship passes over one of the evil aliens' ships, the mouse guy and lizard guy score a direct hit into an open window and fry some commanders.

*I'm watching/participating in a movie where Eminem is facing off against this evil alien android in an immense abandoned warehouse along a pier at night. The android is as evil as he is cocky, and delights in tormenting Em. He insists that Em fight him man to man, but Em secretly has his buddies from D12 go outside and knock loose this old rusty ferris wheel that's on the pier outside, hoping he can lure the android into a trap. Later on, I'm apparently seeing the sequel to the first dream. This time, Eminem finds himself in a small town in Georgia, where the arrival of another alien invader is imminent. The whole town shows up to confront the enemy, armed with whatever they can grab. It turns out that this time the enemy is an indestructible computer mind, perched on a pillar rising out of a room filled with water. Eminem hits it with all he's got, but the dream ended before I could find out if he was victorious or not.

*I'm watching an episode of Law & Order SVU where Will Ferrel is guest starring as this completely delusional cult leader. He alternately thinks he's some Manson-like killer, or the reincarnation of Jesus. They know he's been killing people, but they can't pin it on him. They find a bizarre picture in his apartment with thumbtacks in it that at first they think is a map of the city. Later, they realize it's an extreme blow-up of the skin of someone's neck. He's going to kill someone and steal their neck skin! Eew! They arrive at his new hideout (pushing past a bunch of protesters who say he's innocent), and they find a frighteningly immaculate S&M dungeon, with the victim hung up in a closet in bondage gear, dead and bloody. B. D. Wong's with them, and he sinks to his knees and nearly vomits. The killer gets away. (I have to say, even though this was a dream, I just cannot imagine Will Ferrel being able to pull off a serious role.)

*As it began, I was dreaming I was a driver in a big, futuristic NASCARish race, the difference being that this race was supposed to last for several days. All of us would be locked into our cars, which would be like our own little environments for the duration of the race. Once we're off, we start encountering all sorts of obstacles and traps, and we talk back and forth on the radio, at first being competitive, but then getting to know one another and then even trying to help all of us get through okay. But there's this one car, a small, purple one that hangs near the back, whose driver is ultra competitive and never says a word to us. We all start wondering what kind of an asshole he is. At the end of the race (I have no idea who won, and it doesn't seem to matter anyway), we all pop out of our cars and finally get to see the faces attached to the radio voices. The purple jerk pops out too, and we see it's a peppy, smiling young woman. She comes over to us, and is mystified by the cold reception she gets. Apparently, her inter-car radio was just broken! We all totally misjudged her.

*I'm watching some kind of news video tape made to commemorate contact with alien life forms. I'm somehow watching it in the car, too. It's interesting up to a point, then a lady reporter comes on and starts talking about all the news stories they went on and on and on about during the past year. One of them was about a serial dog-fucker. This insane Mexican guy was driving around, stopping at a certain intersection every time, and sitting in his car, raping some little toy dog, like a chihuahua or a yorkie. People got really upset. Finally, the police put in a secret camera in that spot to catch him, but the news people told about it so much, that other people would stop there, wave at the camera, pet their own dogs, stuff like that. Eventually, the guy does get caught.

*I'm in a little store where really expensive, pretentious collectibles are being sold. There's a little Lewis-Black-esque midget guy selling games and I realize he actually starred as the animated MC of a Sega trivia game in the 90's called 'Bob The Guy'. He seems to be the only normal person there. Everyone else is rail-thin and dumb as a dead canary. There's a big display of Sonic The Hedgehog stuff, and I go over to look, but it's all just high-priced soulless crap. There's even some ugly plushies of the Sonic guys dressed as Dragonball Z characters. People are eating up this trendy manufactured garbage like chocolate. I actually ask one little girl why she likes this stuff and don't get an answer. I'm about to leave, when I see a table near the back with some small sub sandwiches. No one's eating them, because everybody's so weight-conscious in here. I start lovingly and messily devouring one just to make everyone around me sick. "Mmmm! Food!" I say, as they all look at me as though I'm shitting on the floor.

*I was watching a movie trailer. It looked really intelligent and deep. It starred Nicole Kidman as a wealthy woman who commits a desperation murder on a fancy yacht, and Dustin Hoffman as a recently-paroled killer with a Louisiana accent who's been given a job as a local disc jockey and is trying to make something better of his life. It's adapted from an award-winning Japanese movie, and it's trying to examine the transition from 'hero' to 'villain' and 'villain' to 'hero', and inevitably showing that such classifications are fallacious. It looked really good, and I remember blearily hoping that maybe I wasn't just dreaming this, that it would actually come out someday.

*Dreamed that The Bride from Kill Bill was on some kind of mission, and George W. in his cute little 'mission accomplished' flight suit kept hassling her, so she whipped out this huge silver gun and blasted him point-blank in the face in slow motion! It was great!

*There was a very long and detailed dream about animated characters in an animation studio taking over and learning how to create the process on their own. There were cartoons and clay and marionettes and stop-motion characters and all sorts of stuff. Nifty, but mostly forgotten.

*Another dream centered around a futuristic-looking mall that no one realizes has existed since the beginning of time. It's actually the nexus between two mirror universes. There's a really old dude who lives in a little gazebo on the third floor. A shy teenage girl (ala Jennifer Connelly) is friends with him. One day, in a darkened bookshop, she's running through the stacks and bumps into a mirror stretched across the aisle. A mirror that reflects everything *but* her! Somehow she ends up on the other side of it, and finds herself in a very weird alternate reality. It's the same building structure as the mall, but a victorian palace instead! At some point she gets really tiny and is being played with by the women in the palace, poofed around inside this strange organ-like instrument made of dozens of accordions! While this is going on, back in our world, the old guy, figuring he has nothing to lose, is telling some random people outside a restaurant the truth about the mirror worlds, and that if the girl can't get his sword back to the mirror-gazebo at a certain time, both realities will cease to be. Meanwhile, the girl has escaped the instrument and is running along the floor of a big library, with all the big people trying to catch her. There is a rumbling like an earthquake in both worlds, but when the old guy goes to the mirror-gazebo, he finds the girl there just as she should be. Everyone's saved! Hooray!

*I'm younger, and I'm reading this big, orange hardcover in my grandparents' livingroom. The story is about a man who finds his way to this magical, otherworldly place, and it is _gorgeously_ illustrated. Every page has these beautiful, intricate drawings of people and places, all of them bursting with color and detail. It's like a fantasy story, but for grownups. The author presents it like a journal, purely straightforward, as if it all really happened to him. (His 'voice' sounded like Eric Idle, but he wrote a little like Vonnegut) The world is similar to Shangri-La, or the pantheon of Hindu Gods. The world these people inhabit is small, but beautiful, and is actually run by clockwork! There is a separate society of small, robed people who run these gigantic machines inside the planet. Sometimes large pieces of land will cave in and reveal amazing, crop-circle-like tunnels going into the ground. The hooded men immediately fill them up with golden mechanisms and put them to use powering everything aboveground. It all looks like an exposed pocketwatch. There was mention that these hooded men are in a war with some other hooded men on the other side of the planet. But it's really more of an argument; no fighting. They just both try to discover the most holes first. 'A war of holes,' as the author puts it. Another page I remember was about the history of the world, as several Gods on a flying ship/terrace discuss like philosophers how to make the world. There are also long sections about individual people the author meets, many with full-page portraits. There are also some very erotic drawings here, so I try to keep Grandma from seeing these. This dream reminded me of several things from my childhood; a huge Babar anthology, Vaughn Bode's Erotica, Yellow Submarine, Cat Stevens' Numbers album, even the Waldo books; all of them had fantastical visuals I was mesmerized by. I wish I could remember more about the book.

*I'm in either high school or jr. High again. It's first period and there's only a few people in class so far. The teacher's not even there yet. I notice a new kid, a Chinese guy I haven't seen before. He's talking with some guys who're notorious for crazy-ass pranks. Something is definitely about to happen. Then the Chinese guy leans way back in his chair, pulls out this big fountain-type firework, holds it to a crotch like a penis and sets it off! Sparks are going everywhere, screamy noises are deafening everyone, it's the most outrageous thing anyone's ever done in school. Later on, there's an assembly in the gym where the teachers yammer about how irresponsible and dangerous it was.

*Mahesh and I are at a large local theater for the premiere of a new, highly-praised anime movie called 'Sunset'. I don't seem to be too excited about it (maybe we won free passes). The movie is quite beautifully animated, even if it is hand-drawn and then computer colored. The story takes place in some ancient Oriental country. It's small, but very advanced, and run by a very young emperor. They are part of a never-ending war with much older, larger countries all around them; countries that have been fighting each other for centuries. The young emperor is new to the fight and is laughed at by the other leaders. Feeling as though he must prove his honor to them when his citizens protest against the war, he orders nearly all of them to be beheaded. The rest of the film then takes place on a beach where all the citizens are lined up, waiting to be executed. Characters we've followed during the first part show up only to die horribly undeserved deaths. One young man says that it makes no sense to kill him since he's young and fit and can help in the war. The emperor then appoints him to be one of the executioners. The young man then must execute his fellow citizens, his friends, even his fiance. He even loses his beloved pet when the emperor decides all animals of its species must be destroyed too. Another young man is in line to die alongside his girlfriend. When it comes his time, he thinks his friend (the new executioner) will spare him, but when he finds out that's not the case, he panics and begs for his life. For such a dishonorable display, he is taken away and given a much more torturous death. By the end of the film, at sunset, there is hardly anyone left in the emperor's kingdom. Sounds of war can still be heard off in the distance. The emperor shows no emotion. Needless to say, if this was a real movie, I'd hate it. Just like I hated Crouching Dragon and especially Hero: they all had that same feel of crushing, needless, emotionally-manipulative sadness. Then again, if developed a bit more, it could certainly be used to show how some kinds of honor are madness, and how doing things only to keep up appearances to people who hate you in the first place is nothing but self-destruction.

*A movie about a young arctic fox boy whose father has recently died. The movie starts out with the opening scenes of a Christmas film; watching it with his family is a favorite tradition of the boy. We see living snowmen skiing through a snowy countryside to a small Christmas-themed village. In real life however, the boy's life is far from happy. His mom has to work all the time and still can't pay the bills. Their house is huge and drafty. At one point, some men from the bank and the utilities come over to try to work out a deal with the vixen, or else she might lose her electricity, or even the house. The boy runs off to a secret spot in the house all his own to try and escape the situation. He dreams of the Christmas movie again, but this time it's a nightmare. (The same scene actually did turn into stop-motion like The Nightmare Before Christmas.) When he finally snaps out of it, he realizes that all this time he's been holding in his grief for his father and he can't keep it in anymore. He starts crying with his whole heart, screaming, "I WANT MY DADDY!!!" I don't know what happened after that, but I believe the theme of the movie is that there are no miracles. The Christmas movie didn't magically make things better; his father didn't come back to life. You have to solve problems on your own, or accept help from others. This dream was so sad, I actually woke up crying, and _hard_. Hopefully, the boy's crying might have made the utility and bank people decide to help him and his mom out.

*I'm part of a team of superheroes very much like the X-men, only we protect people from occult and paranormal threats (kinda like what Hellboy does). It's New Year's Eve, and also a full moon, and most of the team is busy battling a swarm of supervillains outside our headquarters behind a local mall. I'm not very powerful, so I mostly stay low, stealthing around and helping where I can. There's a lot of people around the mall tonight, partying and watching the fireworks display overhead. I notice a cluster of people in robes who look like druids and leprechauns and stuff gathering in a square formation on the lawn, but don't think much of it. I help my team drive off the villains, but when our mentor finds out that's what we've been spending our time on, he looks like he's about to have a stroke! Apparently a full moon on New Year's Eve is the one night every 500 years where a ritual can be performed that will release the forces of darkness, and evil will rule the next 500 years. I quickly dash back to where I saw those robe people, but it's too late. From where they were standing, the ground has turned inky black and an enormous gnarled black tree-shape has grown from the square where they stood. Purple and red and orange spirit lights emanate from the vortex at the center, where all sorts of halloween-like beasties emerge. The fireworks-watchers aren't panicking much; thinking it must be part of some show. As I run to the source, several giant floating jack-o-lanterns fly over me. But when I reach the center of the phenomenon and look within, what I've already begun to suspect turns out to be true: the glimpses of the other 'dark' world I see inside look like a humongous carnival! I can see some of the people who've been sucked inside riding a Hieronymous-Bosch-esque rollercoaster and getting entertainingly and impermanently snuffed to bits, and loving it! It makes sense to me. Since the forces of 'good' have been running things all this time, we've had uncountable wars, diseases, atrocities, etc. 'Good' doesn't really seem to be doing its job very well. So why should the forces of darkness necessarily be any worse?

*As part of a big class trip, my whole class (I'm pretty sure we're all furries or toons) are staying at my place. My house looks very retro, with lots of circular rooms and big windows. At the moment, we're supposed to be getting ready for bed, since the trip is starting tomorrow. Some of us want to stay up and read or do internet things while some of us want to sleep. I'm in a double bed, looking at Chip & Dale stuff on eBay and doing my best to keep it from bothering anyone, but the bespectacled bunny girl next to me leaves anyway. I quietly walk out into the hall and from the livingroom, two classmates tell me to get a pair of shoes off a pillow near me. I wonder why they can't just do it themselves, but do it anyway. As I'm going back to bed, the closet opens and a sleepy Fifi is inside, curled up on the towels! I tell her she shouldn't have to sleep all cramped up in there and say that she can join me in my bed. She agrees and lies down. I pet her shoulders and back a bit, getting to feel her beautiful, luxurious long purple fur. She's a little irritated to have been woken up, but chats with me a bit and calms down. Too bad that's as far as I can remember.

*I dreamed a fourth movie in Christopher Nolan's Batman series. Yet it was animated, like Gotham Knights. In my dream, the third film had ended with Batman redeeming himself, but defeating the villain in a phyrric victory that leaves the city wondering if he can possibly continue. A few months later, Batman's back. But he's black! Someone new has the cape and cowl on, and they're almost the total opposite of the original. The new Batman is tall, African American and built like a tank. He's more forgiving, talkative, actually smiles and is overall not afraid to let people know that he's as human as everyone else. Commissioner Gordon goes to Bruce Wayne to tell him that he knows who this 'imposter' is. He's actually an ex-con, convicted for multiple assaults and arsons and just paroled recently. Bruce calms his concerns, saying that he himself picked this guy to take over for him for a while. The man's crimes were all vigilante actions, taken to protect the people in his neighborhood. Gordon accepts this, but then the audience learns the truth is even more bizarre: Bruce is still Batman! He recruited the other man right out of prison, put him up in the most luxurious penthouse in Gotham, and spent weeks studying the man to learn his every mannerism. Bruce's last fight had shaken his confidence, and he decided the best way to become Batman again was to re-learn everything from a completely different perspective. He makes a new costume (more like the animated series) with padding and a mask that changes his body shape and face. He learns to imitate his friend's voice perfectly. He looks for crime in places he hadn't considered before and generally does his best to do everything differently. Gotham City embraces him, but they still want the 'real' Batman back. When a new supervillain presents himself, Batman decides it's time to take what he's learned and be himself again, but this time be more open to new ways of doing things. On a snowy street, Gotham sees their new Batman fighting his best against the new villain, but not gaining much ground. That is, until a dark shape flies in and evens the odds. Batman realizes that the city *needs* their hero to be more myth than man. Together, the two Batmans (Batmen?) take out the villain. Afterwards, Bruce gives his friend several million dollars and plane tickets so he can start a new life and not have to fear that the people who put him in prison will find him again. Bruce also apologizes for keeping him cooped up in that penthouse all this time, but his friend smiles and says that after prison, it was a vacation. His friend does ask for one last thing though; if he can peek under Batman's mask and see who he really is. Bruce just smiles and says some things should stay secret, even between friends.

*I'm walking down a nearby street at night, past a small orange-colored zoo with a big lit-up pool and waterslides into it. I sneak in the back because I know that Fifi is being kept in here. But, she's been turned into a lovely anthro shark! She has shiny silver skin instead of purple fur, but with the same voice and personality. We cuddle at the top of one of her waterslides. She is incredibly smooth and soft! We hug and slide down together and she feels confident I'll be able to find a way to change her back.

*I've agreed to spend the night in an enormous, hi-tech mall along with John Stamos and Dave Coullier. We're told our experiences will all be filmed as part of a reality show. We enter past a big baked goods store and soon realize just how big this mall is. The three of us get separated and shop quite a bit. Then slowly, we begin to notice that there's something wrong with this mall. I notice creepy, disturbing things underneath the facade of perky, shiny customer service. I see a KayBee with brand new, exclusive Transformers, but it never seems to be open. I encounter an old woman and her daughter who weave me a bizarre Steven Kingesque story while ritually pricking their fingers. People stampede in seemingly random directions. I come to an area where the escalator simply ends in a twenty-foot drop, the PA is announcing this as a new feature for consumers, and people are happily falling off to their deaths! By now I've realized that the Mall seems to trap people in a continuous loop so they can never leave. I time my jump and land on one of the suicidal escalator people as they fall so I can get to the lower level. I meet up with John and Dave again and we spot Bob Saget, who waves us over. We're about to gorge ourselves at the baked goods place (the pastries are as big as sports equipment!) when I caution that they might be trying to poison us, so we should only eat food we have with us. As we eat, Morgan Freeman comes over to explain things to us. He lifts up what we think is an open window like a shade, revealing a black, dead desert beyond. He says that twenty years ago, some catastrophe rendered Earth uninhabitable for most of the people. Someone figured out though that people wouldn't panic if they could still consume as usual. So an enormous concentration camp was created and made to resemble a mall. Everything being sold was designed to make people gradually lose their sense of individuality and self-worth, and also grow to unquestioningly obey the voice of the PA system. I don't know how the hell the three of us were immune to it then, or how a single night to us could be twenty years in the real world. (Or why there were so many bizarre celebrity cameos in this one!)

*I dream an '80s dark comedy starring Dabney Coleman about a cop having the worst day of his life. Absolutely everything goes wrong for him. There's also a subplot about this crime lord who's untouchable by the police and who has a completely-custom blue and green car he treasures. Throughout the long night, more and more shit happens to the cop character until he ends up looking, and feeling, like some homeless bum. However, he manages to overhear some vital information because the crime lord is talking to his men within earshot and doesn't even notice 'some homeless guy'. The cop rallies together a bunch of the city's vagrants and asks them to all vandalize the crime lord's mansion as a distraction, so he can get inside and arrest him. In the end, instead of the crime lord's gorgeous car getting smashed to bits, as expected for this type of comedy, it's impounded and the cop buys it for himself at police auction.

*I'm in jail for some reason, but don't seem to mind since I'm my toon fox self. Everyone seems to like me, except this one Latino guy with a thin mustache. He whips out a gun and says he's gonna make me eat it. There's dozens of people around but no one does anything. Bravely, I take the gun, cock it, swallow it, and Shoot Him Through My Own Stomach!! How that's even possible, I don't know, but everyone cheers and I'm fine since I'm an indestructible little toon fox.

*I dream a last music video from Michael Jackson. It's very slick and the visuals are extremely sharp. The first part of the song has Janet dancing alone in a parking garage, in a blue & white striped shirt, small jacket, big beret and black bellbottoms. The music is very modern, but empty, and the lyrics are selfish: this part of the song embodies modern music itself. Then Michael shows up. He's in a suit like in Smooth Criminal, but this time everything is jet black except for a sliver of his white shirt. The music is suddenly much different, with an older, stripped-down genuinely good feel, like Michael in the eighties. As he sings, sounding severely pissed at the character Janet's playing, he literally grows taller, and starts ripping out chunks of the empty parking garage, like breaking away chips from a pane of glass, revealing a colorful store behind him. It's a hell of a metaphor; the triumph of old-school Michael over superficial pop heartlessness. The video then went on and devolved into the usual dream randomness, but for a moment there, I really believed I was watching Michael's last message to the music world, and it was amazing.

*A short snippet of me reading a comic book featuring an all-blue Optimus Prime and an all-yellow _female_ Bumblebee in a continuity where they're in the roles of Batman and Robin. I think they both had jet modes too. (I can't picture Megatron as the Joker though, although Starscream could pull that off nicely.)

*Dreamed a computer-animated movie about a young tomboyish girl in overalls and a blond ponytail who would rather go exploring in the caves around her house than play with other kids. One day, she comes across a long, deep red cave like a train tunnel. Suddenly, the sides, floor and ceiling become merely a metal framework over a swirling vortex of purple light! Like some kind of alien launch tube. She scrambles to keep from falling into the swirly stuff, and as she's pulling herself up onto the ceiling beams, comes across a little yellow creature. It seems terrified, so she makes her way to it and manages to get it safely into her pocket. Back at home, she examines the hamster-sized creature more closely. It looks like a frog crossed with a bat. Smooth yellow skin, big ears, big blue eyes. When she takes her gloves off and touches it, it can speak into her mind! He is actually a little boy, belonging to an advanced race of action-figure-sized cave beings. Since it's dark in the cave and their predators hunt by sound, they evolved a way of speaking through direct skin contact. The girl knows she has to get the little frogbat boy back to his family, but for whatever reason she needs a big vehicle to get to the frogbat's city. So she takes her new friend to school with her and tries to slyly lead the teacher into agreeing to use the class' yearly field trip to go to the caves. When the teacher gets suspicious, the girl just gives up and shows everyone the frogbat. He is a big hit, and all the kids want to help him get home. The dream fractured a bit, but I remember the bus driving along at top speed through the metal-and-swirly-stuff version of the cave, with little spaceships in pursuit. A young black girl somehow tumbled out of the bus, and the girl hero had to get up onto the roof to rescue her. There was also a bit where she reached into the purple void and when she pulled her arm back, it had disappeared! Just a perfectly smooth slice of skin. Then little particles of it began swirling back out of the void and quickly reformed into her arm again. Another visual was that of all the frogbats in their advanced cave city, all standing in formation with their hand on the shoulder of the frogbat in front of them so they could all hear their leader 'speaking' on a stage at the front of the enormous crowd.