I Hate My Dreams

Always with the dreams..

I’m in my house.  I’m with my brother and I have a sister.  It’s in the middle of the day.  We’re sitting at the dining room table eating.  Mom and Dad are in the kitchen cooking.  My brother and I start seeing cats outside the window.  Only now we’re outside the window but still at the dining table.  My sister notices that the cats are increasingly being hurt.  Small cuts and nicks we see as the walk by us, as we flick back and forth with the dining table.  Inside the house, now outside.  Every time we see a new cat, we change location.  Now we start to see larger cats, the jungle kind.  These cats have larger wounds, more dire.  Outside.  One cat passes by and now we start to become freaked out.  My sister starts crying.  The cat looks as if it got caught in some large machinery.  There are patches of skin missing, you can see right through the skin to the muscle, no blood in between.  Muscle glistens in the now darkening sky.  Inside.  My sister is paralyzed with fear.  I scream to my Mom and Dad.  Mom’s at the back door, taking pictures of the cats to send to the police and animal control.  They start to pile around the back door.  I tell my Mom to close the door so they won’t come crashing through the screen door.  She closes it.  More cats we see outside the window.  No longer are we changing location.  I’m holding onto my brother.  I’m shaking.  It’s night outside.  The dream begins to change.

My brother is now sitting on the couch.  Mom and Dad have disappeared.  I walk to my room.  Something is in my room.  I walk inside but my room is different.  My room has the space and feel of a scientist’s lab.  I walk back out to the living room where my brother is on the couch and I see a person in pain.  I go to him to see what’s wrong and stop in my tracks.  Parts of him are disintegrating.  I scream.  Running to my room and the man responsible is there.  (Think of the mad scientist in The Re-animator.)  He sticks a syringe full of liquid in this woman.  This is the one, surely this one will finally take it and change it.  I can tell what he’s thinking, feeling.  He lets her loose.  She runs out of my room into the rest of the house.  I follow.  At first everything seems normal.  Then she starts to whimper.  I go to her, ask if she’s alright.  She turns to me, a look of terror on her face.  She holds her left arm out to me and shrieks.  From the elbow to the wrist, her arm is shriveling up and disappearing.  She’s not in any pain though.  I know this.  The serum causes no pain.  She keeps screaming nonstop until that part of her arm is completely gone.  Once it was no longer there, she collapsed and died.  Backing away slowly, I turn back to go to my room.  Somehow I know that man is still there.  He’s watching everything that’s happening.  Another failure.  I want the other one, need to catch her.  SHE is the one who I’m waiting for.  I’m quivering as I walk slowly back to my room, hoping he won’t see me, but he will.  His thoughts are in my head.  They flitter in and out.  Want her.  Need her.  I peek my head around the corner of my door and he grabs me.  I cry out to anyone, but no one is in the house anymore.  I’m pulled and thrown into my room.  I smack my back against the far wall.  The man comes towards me, speaking of how I have finally come.  Some sort of destiny. 

Screw that. 

All I know is I want away from this man and his deranged thoughts.  He sees it in my eyes and now a seed of doubt is born in his mind.  She may be the key, but everything must go according to my plan.  Don’t mess this up.  The last startled me, but he was closer.  Damn it, when I hear his thoughts I lose time.  I can’t afford to.  He’s speaking to me but I’m not listening.  I look for a way out.  Once the man is close enough I kick the syringe out of his hand and bolt for the door.  He grabs me by the hair as I pass by and throws me against some of the tables, knocking down whatever experiments are on the table.  It knocks the breath out of me and I see him walking towards another table.  Oh my God, the amount of syringes on the table is astounding!  I gather what wits I have left and sprint to that table, grab a syringe and dash out the door.  The man tries to grab me again but he barely misses.  I’m running through the living room, the man behind me.  He chases me through the kitchen and back to the living room.  So many times he almost sinks that needle into my skin.  I’m running on pure adrenaline.  I NEED HER.  His resolve is terrifying.  I run back to my room and manage to get the door closed right before he hits the door with his full body.  The door shakes.  I barely am able to hold it closed.  Please, please don’t let this man get through.  The door is caught in a battle of strength and will.  I have the will to keep it closed, but the man behind the door is much stronger than me.  His leg gets through and I stick him with the syringe I stole and push down.  He wails in pain.  No no!  This can’t be happening, she’s ruining everything!  He’s already in the room.  Shit, more time lost.  I’m on the other side of the room.  I look at him.  He is monstrous.  There is nothing human about him any longer.  He raises his face to the sky and howls.  He looks back at me with such loathing it roots me on the spot…

And I wake up.