Following a night's worth of dreaming, sweet, billowing dreams about a kind new face, I woke at 4 am to the sound of Gabriel crying. After putting him back to sleep, I found my way back to bed and had one, long, successive dream that kicked me awake.
I don't remember the beginning of the dream, but ended up watching a small, limby little olive-colored goblin. The creature had an ugly look on his face and kept his hands rubbing one another nervously while peering from side to side. He was the only person around (which made me think, despite watching him from afar, that I was the goblin myself, although I never registered anything he was feeling). Standing near a giant bulldozer parked at the end of a large tin building, he restlessly waited. There were other buildings scattered around, as well as stacks of hay, old field equipment, and ramshackle chain-link fences here and there.
Soon, a woman walked toward the goblin; her steel grey hair was covered in a thick scarf and I couldn't see much of her face, but she seemed full of a quiet goodness and strength. As she approached the little being, he quickly jumped off the bulldozer and began to run. Finding his way through fence holes and piles of tools, he ran alongside the white tin building, his feet padded by the fresh straw that matted the ground. He noticed a number of curious things as he ran along, but my mind can't make sense of most of them. A few times, he had to slow down and use his pointy feet to tip-toe past some resting animals or people. I remember seeing a white horse laying with his back to us, and a hazy glow all around him. I couldn't bring the horse into focus, and he seemed to terrify the goblin, who snuck quickly past.
I quickly realized the goblin, who had left the old lady far behind, was no longer trying to outrun anybody but was searching for something somebody had hidden. I don't know what it was, but knew it to be about the size of an apple, but square, hidden within an old miniature chest, wrapped in brown paper, and strung up tight with twine. I could feel the goblin concentrating on where the object could be, and sensed some sort of deep radar emanate from him as we passed mounds of hay and dirt, as if he were x-raying for the parcel as he swept past. His frustration grew as he moved along, but so did his excitement.
As he got to the end of the long building he had been pacing, he walked slowly out from the edge of the wall. The building was entirely open on this side, showing wide, three-walled shelter for farm work. When the goblin stepped into the sight of the inside of the building, a peasant woman busy working with heavy canvas looked up. She let out a high scream and stood up, her smudged hands flying to her mouth. The goblin knew he had made a mistake in being seen, but didn't seem to care much. He closed his narrow little eyes tight and disappeared entirely. Immediately, he reappeared on the roof of the building, but the worker woman couldn't see him any longer.
The scene shifted here, and I became a part of the dream myself. The sky, before an unremarkable white, darkened dramatically. A high, towering fence appeared across from me, trapping me in the spot with the open tin building to my left, a jagged mountain edge to my right, and walls of hay behind. I was in the body of a young man, bespectacled but strong, and had a good friend standing with me. A large group of evil men, mostly hooded in black and charcoal robes, came flying down the dark mountainside toward us. One man, with curly gray hair and a walking cane crowned with a silver serpent head, headed for me, grinning maliciously.
"It's over, you know," he said triumphantly, his words bringing cheers from the rest of the group. "I'm sure you're well aware that there's no hope for you now."
A shorter, fat man ambled up to me, jeering, and roughly tied my hands behind my back with a thick rope. Another person did the same to my friend, and the group began to push us into the building to our left (which was the open-sided farm building before, but was now black and ominous). Knowing my friend and I were caught and well done for, I tried to pop my head over the fence that barricaded us in as we walked past. Seeing (or sensing) a number of snakes slithering around on the other side, I shouted a warning to them, knowing they were friends and were very much on our side. My voice yelled hoarsely, but finished with a gentle hiss. The fat man who was still holding my roped hands shoved me away from the fence with a laugh, and we entered the black building.
It seemed to be an indoor amusement ride; the room was spacious and dark, tinged with a poisonous green glow pushing from the many corners of the place. There was a number of roller coaster seats waiting on the right side, and my friend and I were placed into one and buckled in. There seemed to be more people who had been captured with us, and they were also pushed down and tied into the cars. To our left and down ten feet or so, there was a river (inside) full of green, slightly swaying water. I heard the crude laughter of the man with the walking cane and heard gears begin to turn, though I couldn't see what our captors were doing behind us.
The coaster car was suddenly plunged into the emerald water and plummeted down as we sat powerless to unbind ourselves. After taking a great gulp of the glittering water, I felt a strength surge through me and easily freed my hands from the ropes that held them together. I slunk ungraciously through the rope tethering me to the heavy, sinking seat and quickly turned to help free my friend from his binds, as well. At this time, I felt my body turn back into its normal self; I was me again.
I swam to the surface and climbed out. I was in the same place, but had gone further down a passageway, which was better lit and more theatrical than frightening. I realized it was just part of the test, and I could feel sets of people ahead and behind me, working to solve the next problem in the course. Although everybody was paired up, I was alone, though not bothered by it. I climbed up a set of castle-like stairs made of wood and entered a small room with shadowed alcoves lining the sides. There were brightly striped banners pinned to the walls, which were made of heavy, gray stones, mortared together. I saw a few stuffed animals (a teddy bear, a small pink elephant) talking amongst themselves at the end of the room. As I neared them, they fell silent and looked over at me. After a few tense seconds, a small, brown-papered object flew out from under the foot of the bear and shot past my head. I dodged out of the way and looked behind me, where I watched as the grubby little package fell into a small, semi-caged floor lowered from our level. Inside, there was a giant polar bear, who was snarling angrily at me.
I jumped down to his level, swiftly grabbed the package, and patted the polar bear on his back. He immediately became docile and tried to direct me where to go next. I couldn't understand anything he said, but thanked him and climbed back up to where the stuffed animals were lingering. The animals were no longer there, but two people were. A middle-aged man and woman stood there, smiling at me. The woman was very rosy-cheeked, portly, and kind-looking, and her curly red hair reminded me of somebody I had once been very close with. The man, who was taller and thinner, had a much sharper look to his face, although he was smiling warmly. His dark teal robes were tattered, and his face was scarred up, his graying hair disheveled.
I greeted the company warmly without words and noticed a small vent behind the woman's head. A way out! I thought delightedly, feeling I was still trapped in the strange, deadly game the captors had thrown me into. I pushed the face of the vent, which gave easily, and opened onto a purely white, wide sky. Suddenly, I realized the building had caught fire. Behind me, I saw a bowl of porridge whose sides and spoon had blackened and warbled strangely in the heat from the unseen flame. I grabbed the hands of the couple and began to weave my way through the following passage. Through the dark, stone-walled hall, I turned quickly, left, right, left, left, and ended up in a small, kitchen-like area just like my real kitchen.
I was relieved to see our window was still there, and, pushing it open, crawled halfway out of it. I grabbed onto the wood overhanging the house, which felt warm from the fire. As I let myself down, I was surprised to find myself only a foot away from the ground. The others inside followed suit. Somehow, our realization of what was happening obliterated the evil gang that had caught and bound us; they were entirely gone. The obstacles they had put up for us was just a game- they pretended that we had a chance to fight for our lives, but, I now knew, they had planned to kill us all, just the same.
Outside of the building (now my house), I saw a number of my family members mulling around, nursing small wounds or coughing. Through the opened kitchen window I had escaped from, somebody (my mother?) handed me a bag full of carrots, which I happily accepted. The hand then popped out with a handful of celery. I smiled, stowed the food away into my clothing, and crawled back inside. Only half of the building was on fire, and some people were still wading around or waiting to get out. I grabbed something of Oma's off the counter, a strange, ornate muffin tin stamped with images of leering sugar skulls, and put it into my satchel with the vegetables. I also took a framed picture of Oma (the one in her thirties standing on the grass in front of the pine tree), as well as a photograph of my mother's grandmother.
As I closed up my bag and went back outside, I saw my uncle Chris. He smiled at what I was doing and told me he used to play flute for a street band (which he called an alley band) named the Joe Strummer Fog Trains. Somehow, he had forgotten most of his life, what he knew, and even his own name. His brain was somehow terribly addled by the fire, smoke, and trauma of what had happened inside, although he looked content and happy. I caught a glimpse of Laena's fiancé, Danny, who said something about a song he had written about the experience inside called "Sooted Thieves in the Fire." The entire family had gone through the inferno and we had come out together.
