Thread: Oneironaut's Matrix

10/19-2005
"Epic Lucid Dream."

Ok, this started off, innocently enough with me and 3 of my waking life friends (not counting the separate dream, or true beginning to this one, that I can't really recall) In the dream, it was myself, Jesse, Todd, and I'm pretty sure the last one was Bruce. We were up in this apartment one morning. If I'm not mistaken, someone had brought me a small telescope as a gift. (...a telescope? o.O) Anyway, this thing was pretty tight. It was all gold and shit, and was small, like some antique from the captain's quarters of some great old ship. So I go over to the window of this apartment and throw open the blinds, taking the telescope and having a look around.
Looking across the street, I was seemingly in a sort of run-down town, which, again, reminded me somewhat of coverage I've seen from New Orleans. (The only comparison I could really make.) Peering through the window and focusing the telescope, I look out, parallel to our approx 6th story window at the building across the street. Bringing the scope into a little more focus, I see someone with a pair of binoculars which seemed to be pointed back at me.



"What the...?" I turn around and grab the attention of my friends and they all walk over to the window. Looking back through the scope, I find that this person was actually looking down toward the street. So I panned down with the telescope and looked at what seemed to be quite a chaotic sight below. Moving from person to person with the scope, I saw what looked like the final moments of a massive store looting, the store itself just out of my field of view, blocked by another building. People were walking around the streets carrying whatever it is they could, a few police units around, but ultimately not enough to stop what was going on. So, as we are watching all of these people after turning on the news to hear the coverage of it, I’m looking through the scope at these people over by the area where the battered store would be, and all of a sudden there is this huge crash. It was as if a car had came out of nowhere and plowed through a bunch of people, throwing them off to the side, violently, out of the range of my scope, and behind the building that was blocking my view…..Except..there was no car. Only a strange black blur that came and went like some onyx gust of wind.

“…..Did anyone just see that?” I asked. By this time, Bruce had opened the balcony door beside me and was stepping out of the deck to get a better view. “Those people,” I continued. “Something just kinda…Crashed into em….and swept them off the street!” I wasn’t looking through the scope any more. “Yeah,” said Bruce. “And flew right up into the leaning tower of Pisa over there.” There was a shock in his voice when he said that, and when I craned my neck to look at him, he was gazing, awestruck, around the side of our building from the balcony. I got up from where I was, walked out onto the deck, and turned to the right to look down the perpendicular side of our apt building. There, in the distance, behind the backdrop of an entire city that seemed to be in shambles, and highways that stretched on for miles (some of which were collapsed if I remember correctly) was a MASSIVE tower that stretched crookedly up into the distant skies. It looked like something straight out of Digital Blasphemy, the 3d art site I was browsing shortly before bed.

“WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?!?!” I asked, damn near falling off of the balcony to get a better view.
We were all standing on the balcony now, and I think it was the shock of seeing such a monolithic structure that brought me into a very very Low level of lucidity. I didn’t say anything at first about this being a dream, and actually I don’t think I was REALLY sure that it was a dream, but I had my hunch, and that was all I needed. “….I’m Going!” I said. Everyone snapped their eyes toward me. “What are you talking about??” “I’m Going!” I repeated, my sense of curiosity getting the better of me. “There is some strange shit going on here, and I’m going to find out what.” I either tossed the telescope away or just didn’t have it any more. “If you’re coming, follow me, and do what I do.” I didn’t feel I had much time to explain the whole lucidity thing, but I was definitely feeling it. I took a few steps forward and dove over the balcony railing. Free-falling sickeningly toward the ground below, which had began to clear of crowds after the strange occurrence. Diving straight down, I tucked my chin and rolled forward, front flipping one half time and landing on both feet with a small crouch, sort of like Kadaj’s building dive in Advent Children. Before I knew it, I was hearing the feet of my friends landing behind me. No one asked any questions as to how it was we just jumped from about 6 stories up, but it was about to get weirder anyway.



“Ok, so how do you suggest we get over there?” Todd, asked. Exhaling once, I tried to give the easiest directions I could. “Just tell yourself that you’re dreaming, and follow me.” Of course this got the deer-in-headlights reaction from all three of them. No further words, I took my own advice, knowing that it would be a far distance to the tower, and flying, sometimes, was not my strong point unless I was in the right frame of mind. I closed my eyes. “I’m dreaming I’m dreaming I’m dreaming!!” I demanded to myself reassuringly. Boom. It was like I was opening my eyes for the very first time. A sense of confidence washed over me as the world became all that much more vivid.
“So…you’re dreaming?” Bruce asked, a bit confused. I didn’t even answer. I just ran forward and lept into the air, the wind screaming in my ears as I shot toward the horizon like a missile, ascending toward the huge architectural marvel in the distance.

I thought nothing of flying, which is the way I have the best luck with it. My mind was simply on getting from point A to point B. It was only a matter of seconds before my feet touched down upon the high circumference of the tower's main balcony. This thing had to be a few miles high; a twisted wonder of stone that seemed it was erected back in a time long since forgotten. I gazed in through one of the numerous balcony doors and began to walk forward. Turning my attention behind me, I’d noticed that Bruce and Todd were already walking on the stone surface, right on my heels, Jesse was just landing as well. No words about why we were able to do the things we were doing, we entered the tower like some sort of small, unlikely task force (which corresponds to the idea behind the LD’ing story I've been planning to write in the future).





Surprisingly enough, the inside of this tower looked more like a run-down urban apartment than some regal empirical landmark. Couches, a tiny kitchen area that would have barely fit the four of us. Food left out on the counters, and a large steak, which still looked fresh, in a pan on the stove.
From here on, things are a little more hazy. But it seems there is this old man that lives in this tower. And let me just say, I’ve faced some pretty rough characters in my dreams, but this guy was Bad. After what was most likely a long utterance of “I’m taking this world over” clichés, the fight broke out. This guy’s magic was crazy, and he was no slouch at hand to hand. While the others were a little reluctant, not quite sure of their powers, I suppose, I went all out on this guy with Kung Fu flavor that would have made Jet Li cower.
But GodDAMN was this guy good.

Punch kick block kick block punch block dodge kick feign punch wall-smash punch floor-break dodge punch. Fists and feet were flying everywhere, but I was just not making any progress with this guy. And on top of that, just as it seemed the others were ready to throw down…this old bastard just disappears; so quick that we are left standing in this, what seemed to be a bedroom (or study. It wasn’t furnished, and there were paint cans and newspapers all over the place) all alone and wondering just wtf happened. We knew that the only way out of this dead end bedroom was back through the hallway we’d just passed, because the massive room nearest the balcony is the one that connected all the rooms on the top floor.

Slowly, we began to file out of the room, and as we went through the hallway, I made my way to the front of the group. One hand held low, I concentrated my mind on the pyrokinesis I knew was possible, because I still knew I was dreaming. (just not enough to KNOW that I could defeat this guy) My hand flickered once and then ignited into a bright orange flame. I held the flame around my hand while searching with my eyes for any signs of the old man.



There was another small room (small is a relative term. It was still pretty big) that was parallel to the much smaller kitchen in the center of the hallway. Slowly I made my way toward it. Behind me, I heard a familiar Fwooosh and saw a flash of light. When I turned around, I’d seen that Bruce had followed my lead and found his own ability to produce a flame like mine. He smiled enthusiastically, holding up his flaming hand, and I couldn’t help but do the same. However, unfortunately, I hadn’t stopped walking toward the room when I looked back at Bruce, and when I turned to look inside of the room as I crossed the doorframe, I was blindsided.
A vicious punch crashed into the side of my face and sent me to the side, I countered with multiple fire blasts from both hands, swinging my arms like an ambidextrous pitcher and assaulting this guy with pyrotechnics. His own magic countered horrifically well, though, small explosions of blues and greens emanating from his person to show that the fire blasts were simply having no effect. Finally, before I could get another shot off, or think of another tactic, the old man fired some green energy blast that blew me off of my feet and sent me crashing into the wall behind me, now on the left side of the room from the doorway. Shaking off the cobwebs, I glanced up to see the others streaming into the room, battle cries filling the air as they all went 3 on 1 with this fucker. It was all out war with this guy…and we were losing.



I stood up and tried to clear my mind. I needed a charge of energy, and if that meant destroying this room to do it, so be it. I doubted the small explosion I was about to cause would have effected either of us too much, the way we were fighting, but the energy I would get from it would be invaluable. Clenching my fists, I began to well up my energy like a Saiya-Jin, a low “rrrrrrrrrrrraaahhhhh….” Building up in my throat. I could feel the coming energy start to push outward from my center, beginning to crack the floor under me, bendind the wall behind me out into the hall, and pushing the ceiling over my head up into itself.

However, I was not focused. I think it was the sounds of our side losing that broke my concentration and kept me from getting that explosive power of the SuperSaiyaJin, that I was going for, and that probably would have won the fight for us. Not sure whether to keep charging or not, I suddenly noticed that everything had fallen silent. I stopped focusing my energy all together and opened my eyes. The old man had disappeared again, leaving us alone in the room.
The battle was definitely taking its toll. We were all suffering from various levels of kicked-ass syndrome. We were much more reluctant to search for him this time, but were definitely feeling a sense of responsibility. My lucidity was beginning to fade right about this time, but I was still very much in non-lucid control of my actions.

We filed, slowly, out of the second bedroom, passing the kitchen that was almost straight across from it. Jesse leaned into the kitchen and stepped inside. Obviously exhausted, he uttered something like “God, I Have to Eat Something,” as tiredly as if he was in a trance, and the only thing that could save him was food, even at a time like this. (Lol..that Jesse…always eating.) So he goes straight for the huge steak on the stove and begins to cut it. A bit disgusted, not to mention thinking this was Not the time for food, I said, “Man, what are you doing?! Don’t eat That!”
The second I said this, the fuckin pantry door beside us slides open and inside the old man stands, covered from head to toe in a pantry full of…insect larvae. (Yeah..I know….wtf?! )The only thing we could see was his face, and the stone dead gaze of his whitish blue eyes that implied he might have been fighting us all while blind.

He said “You have all fought well, but you will never escape my locusts!” And an endless flood of flying locusts streamed out of the pantry, covering the entire top floor of the tower in seconds, before we even had a chance to think. I was able to bust off a few more pyro blasts from my hands, even though I wasn’t lucid any more, while I staggered through the hallway away from the kitchen, but the blasts seemed to just dissolve in the thickening cloud of locusts with no effect.
“Your powers are useless!” I could hear the old man’s voice through the swirling buzz around me. “My locusts feed off your energies! Your powers will drain, and soon you will feel your life force slipping from you!”

He was right. Being no longer lucid, I could feel myself being suffocated by millions of locusts swarming around me, masses of them coating my body like mud. I could hear nothing from my friends and was finding it harder and harder to stand. One of my very few tastes of dream defeat, I finally collapsed to my knees amongst the relentless swarm, prolonging the inevitable by trying to stand again, but to no avail.
I was so tired.
So tired that I knew I couldn’t go on.
So, there on the floor, still in a knelt position, refusing to go down any further, I closed my eyes, and welcomed the darkness.
…..and then I woke up.

Damnit……….this isn’t over…his ass is MINE.