Chapter 17: Dreams
- Location
- Washington
You have to admit, you were pretty tired. Falling asleep in the bathtub and almost drowning was proof enough of that. It has been a long night, and you should head to bed before you pass out on your feet. But before you do, you figure it'd be best to speak with one of your friends before you head off to bed. Eli and Danielle were probably fast asleep by now so probably for the best if you leave them be. That leaves Sierra and Lucas. You mull over who you should talk to for a bit before deciding on Lucas. You and Sierra have talked plenty tonight, Lucas could use someone to talk to.
You go and knock on his door. You hear footsteps approaching the door from the other side, and soon it swings open.
"Oh, hey Medea." Lucas greeted grinning. "What's up?"
"I was hoping we can talk."
Lucas laughs. "But we just talked a few seconds ago."
"I just wanted to chat a little more before I head to bed." You shrug. "I figured I've been spending most my time talking to Sierra, so I felt like I was neglecting the rest of you a bit."
"Eh, no worries," He shrugs, stepping to the side and giving you accesses to enter the room. "Come on in."
Accepting the invitation you walk into the bedroom, heading over to the bed and taking a seat on it.
"So what did you want to talk about?" Lucas asks as he walks over to the bed, sitting next to you.
You sigh. There was only one thing that you can really talk about.
"Lucas..." You said. "What is even going on anymore?"
"What do you mean?"
"Everything!" You yelled, a little louder than you intended to given that Lucas flinches at your raised voice. "First there was that creepy door, then that whistling, that thing in the woods, that old man, this house! Nothing is right about any of this! What is actually going on anymore?"
"How should I know?" Lucas asked. "I'm out my depth here, Medea. Hell, we all are."
"So you agree there is something wrong going on?"
"Well, yeah, no shit." He shrugs, looking around the room with a trouble expression. "But at least the old man seems... helpful, I guess. I got this creepy vibe from him, but considering he is letting us stay in his place away from... whatever it is that's outside, and gave us some stuff to help fix up Danielle I'm going to let it slide."
"Speaking of that thing outside, did Danielle say what it was?" You look at Lucas with a curious expression.
"'Fraid not." Lucas shook his head. "All she would say was that it was all kind of a blur. She remembers pushing you away, spraying it in the face, and then being crashed into. I didn't feel I should press the issue, she did take a blow to the head."
"Right..." You mumbled. You were kind of disappointed to hear that. You were hoping for a little more detail so that you'd have a better idea of what you were dealing with. Lucas seems to sense your troubled thoughts and gently places a hand on your shoulder.
"Hey, at least she remembers anything. A blow to the head can cause some real problems, we're lucky she isn't suffering any major memory loss issues." He gives you a reassuring smile. "So once she gets back to her normal happy-go-lucky self we'll ask her again."
When he puts it like that, it could have been worse. You were fortunate that she was safe now. You return Lucas' smile with one of your own, nodding your head in agreement.
"That said," Lucas removes his hand from your shoulder, his expression becoming serious. "I'll be happy once we are all out of here. Might have to tell Sierra we'll have to put a rain check on watching The Fly together. Think I had my fill of scary shit for one lifetime..."
"I don't think she'll be too upset about that," You say with a chuckle. "I think we are all on the same page."
You push yourself up from the bed, standing to your full height.
"Right, well, I'm off to bed now."
"Oh? You sure you want to go?" He chuckles, leaning back while giving you a flirtatious smile. "Could stick around, let off some steam."
"As tempting as that offer is, I think I'll pass." You replied sarcastically, giving Lucas a glare.
"Good night, Medea." Lucas chuckles.
"Good night, Lucas." You reply with a nod. You head on over to the door, stepping out of the room and closing the door behind you.
Now that you were done speaking with Lucas you cross the hall over to the room Sierra was staying in. You've thought about it and you didn't feel like sleeping alone tonight. You doubt there would be room with Eli and Danielle, and you don't want to deal with Lucas' advances, so that just left Sierra. Sierra did make you the offer of staying with her, so it was convenient.
Having cross the threshold you slowly open the bedroom door, the door's hinges creaking steadily as it opened. As the door opened the lights of the hall flooded inside the dark room, and from the bed you hear a grumble of displeasure. Glancing towards the bed you see Sierra flip around, facing away from the light and pulling the sheets over her head. Realizing you were disturbing her sleep you moved into the bedroom as quickly as possible, shutting the door behind you and cutting off the light and plunging the room back into total darkness.
Now that you were sure that you were no longer disturbing Sierra's rest you quietly tip-toe over to the bed. You go through the process of removing clothes to make yourself more comfortable and then slip into the bed.
"Hey Sierra," You whisper. "You up?"
"Am now..." She grumbles from under the covers.
"Just wanted to say good night."
"Good night, Medea..." she mumbles as she snuggles her head to her pillow.
Feeling that was all you were going to get out of her you sigh and turn your attention to the ceiling. You stare up at it for a good few moments, but tiredness soon takes hold of you and you being drifting to sleep.
You open your eyes and find yourself in someplace other than the bedroom, and once again you realize that this was a dream. You were sitting on a swing set, the rusted chains holding your seat squeaking as it shifted back and forth. The swing set was standing on a reflective surface, much like that of a mirror or water, and on all sides you were surrounded the distant scenery of nebulae. A seemingly endless array of stars and colored interstellar clouds formed into shapes and patterns as far as your eye could see. It was a sight that was breathtaking beautiful.
"Medea Parth..." you hear whispered from behind.
You swivel your head around and and see that blue glowing mist being from previous dream standing a good ten feet away, the swirling lights that make up its "face" swirling in a formation that made it look like it had the symbol for infinity on its "face". You wondered to yourself, what meaning this being has in your dream? You've heard that things you see in your dreams have some sort of symbolism for what your feelings are, but you have no idea what this thing could be about.
Regardless, you feel you should speak with this thing, if only to indulge your dream a bit.
You hop of the swing and immediately the sound of cracking glass reaches your ears. You look down at the ground below and you spy a crack on your feet on the reflective surface, it growing longer and spreading out as you looked at it. Your eyes grow wide and you turn around to look at the mist being to yell for help, but the ground shatters beneath you.
You fall.
You fall into the empty expanse of space, shards of broken glass drifting past you as you fall. You look up towards where you fell and see the mist being looking down at you from the edge, its lack of a proper face making it difficult to gauge just what it was thinking or feeling as it watched you fall into the infinite. The being raises its "hand" and once again you see that same kaleidoscope sigil from the last dream appear before it, and suddenly you stop falling.
Or rather, you land.
You look down and see that you were standing on some sort of platform. It was round and stretched out to about a good sixty feet, and it looked to be like that being's kaleidoscope sigil but in a stained glass window form. You look back up to the bridge and find that it had vanished, the being also no where in sight.
Confused, you focused back on the platform, but were startled by a new sight. Appearing on the platform was a stone door with an image of you engraved on it, and in front of it were two altars. Curious by the suddenly appearing door you cautiously approached it and grip its handle. You pull but the door won't budge.
"Thou art not ready yet..." You hear whispered around you.
To your right a flash of blue light catches your attention and you turn to see the cause. In the distance on a floating island stood a misty forest which was illuminated by the bobbing and dancing lights of wisps, and leading up to it from the platform was a path made up of sapphire stones.
You don't have much time to linger on the sudden forest before another light shined to your left, a green one this time. You turn to look and you spot a massive structure standing upon a floating island much like the forest. In front of the structure was a massive stairway and two statue of pharaohs and with what appeared to be hieroglyphic engravings on the walls. Just by looking at it you could tell that this was just the entrance and no indicative of the overall building. From the platform to the structure was another path, this one made up of emeralds.
And once more another light shined, this time from behind and red. You turned to look and you see a path of ruby stones leading up to another floating island. On the island it looked like a battlefield, covered in charred earth, ruined and smoldering military vehicles, and corpses which were too far away to make any details of. In the distance you can see flashes of artillery fire and explosions, the faint sounds of metal clashing and gunfire resounding into your ears.
"The Path of the Mystic, the Path of Knowledge, and the Path of Strength lie open to thee, Medea Parth... Choose wisely..."
You look up to the sky, silently looking around for whoever it was that was speaking to you but finding no one. You turn your attention to the three floating islands, wondering at the meaning behind this dream...
[ ] Demand answers - Write In (1d100) (Second option can be chosen)
[ ] Walk the path to the forest.
[ ] Walk the path to the library.
[ ] Walk the path to the battlefield.