House on the Hill, Braiding
House on a hill. About 11 years old. Mom had me connect an extension cord to the RV. It was connected to about three other extension cords, all of them at least 200 feet long each The RV was slowly driving away and the cord stopped feeding smoothly. I jumped aboard, while mom was yelling at me to get out, I untangled the cord. I jumped out just as the RV headed down the hill.
There was something shaggy and black in the driver's seat that was looking back at me.
The RV rolled down to the end of the street and off a pier into the ocean. There was a lightning strike on the house from where the cord was going into the ocean. Mom dragged me off into a spot behind a retaining wall and there were several more lightning strokes, I could see the charges roaring up through the extension cords from out of the ocean. Finally a loud explosion rocked the hillside and knocked me to my fee.
When we stood up there was no more house. Only the opening in the ground where the basement was.
I advanced to the edge to look over into the smoking pit. The basement wasn't full of debris like I thought it would be, instead there was a pile of rubble that used to be the stairs, and an open archway over a tunnel leading down a long hallway with shallow shelves carved along each side. I'd never seen that before. An Ossuary, I know, but the me in the dream didn't know what it was. There was a glowing golden alter at the end of the tunnel in a room that was likely to be circular. Just an assumption from what I could see from up above. Thankfully, there were no zombies walking around in the basement. I looked real hard for them, for some reason expecting to see some wandering aimlessly around.
"Dad is gonna be really angry." I thought to myself.
Mom took me over to the tennis courts, the chain link fence on the house side having been burnt and the plastic shade cloth was all black and melted. She made several phone calls while we waited there for Dad to come back home. She had to pull me back from the fence a couple of times as I was trying to see what was going on in the basement, or if there was any indication of what happened to the RV.
He didn't come for us, though. A helicopter finally arrived to pick us up and take us away, but Dad wasn't in it. Mom gave me the option to stay or go. I wanted to stay, and find out what was going on below the house. I didn't tell her that part, of course. As we turned to leave, armed frog-faced men jumped out of the helicopter, I thought they were armed with spear guns, tridents in them, and Mom shouted at me to run. I ran. The frogmen got mom and the helicopter took off to try to follow me.
I had an almost overwhelming urge to leap down into the tunnel and run to the altar, but it was too far to jump and I came to my senses at the last second. I took my jacket off as I ran into some bushes. Wrapping it around a stone like my friend EA had once done, I tossed it down the hillside. The helicopter followed it. I snuck back up and over the other side of the hill. I picked up Mom's purse. It had several hundred dollars in it, and lots of expensive looking jewelry. I took the whole thing with me.
On the other side of the hill I ran into Raven, from Teen Titans. She wasn't really Raven, just looked like her. She started to teach me how to manipulate the shadows and to find the fear in mortal minds. Suddenly Mom was back, inside my head, telling me to turn away from the Dark Side. I thanked Raven for showing me her skills, said I didn't know if they would be useful to me and wished her luck. She kissed me on top of the head, having to get on tiptoe to do so. I hadn't realized until then that she was actually shorter than me. It was weird to realize that there was an adult, shorter than me (meaning that there may have been more than one.)
I continued down the far side of my hill until I made it into town. I found a small hotel with no one parked outside. I conned my way into a room, saying my mom had given me her credit card and wallet to reserve us a room while she was interviewing for a job. I used the card to reserve the room and went and let myself in. I spent the night frightened and jumpy. I awoke just at first light. I left, without checking out. I just wrote a note saying we had to leave in a hurry, and carefully forged my mom's signature from her driver's license. I didn't want to use up my cash. I made my way back up the hill. Dad was at the top of the basement. No sign of any helicopters. He was very sad looking, and his face was puffed up in a way that made him look a little like the frogmen. It was obvious he'd been crying, a lot.
He spotted me and signaled me to stay hidden. He opened his wallet and dropped all his cash on the ground as he walked past where I was hiding. He also dropped a pair of tickets for a train to Denver.
"Run away, far away." he croaked through his tears. He then jumped down into the basement. I grabbed the money, but couldn't run away yet. I made my way over to where I could see down the tunnel. Dad vanished into the room, and the altar flashed.
The room vanished, the basement wall back to what I'd remembered, though strange for being sunlit. I suddenly knew I wouldn't see either of them again. Dad's wallet was laying on the ground near the edge, like he knew I would follow rather than running away. I scooped it up and ran down into the town, planning on buying clothing and jewelry with the credit cards and then destroying them before getting on the train. I knew, however, that I would be back to find out what was going on with the altar and the hidden room.
There was something shaggy and black in the driver's seat that was looking back at me.
The RV rolled down to the end of the street and off a pier into the ocean. There was a lightning strike on the house from where the cord was going into the ocean. Mom dragged me off into a spot behind a retaining wall and there were several more lightning strokes, I could see the charges roaring up through the extension cords from out of the ocean. Finally a loud explosion rocked the hillside and knocked me to my fee.
When we stood up there was no more house. Only the opening in the ground where the basement was.
I advanced to the edge to look over into the smoking pit. The basement wasn't full of debris like I thought it would be, instead there was a pile of rubble that used to be the stairs, and an open archway over a tunnel leading down a long hallway with shallow shelves carved along each side. I'd never seen that before. An Ossuary, I know, but the me in the dream didn't know what it was. There was a glowing golden alter at the end of the tunnel in a room that was likely to be circular. Just an assumption from what I could see from up above. Thankfully, there were no zombies walking around in the basement. I looked real hard for them, for some reason expecting to see some wandering aimlessly around.
"Dad is gonna be really angry." I thought to myself.
Mom took me over to the tennis courts, the chain link fence on the house side having been burnt and the plastic shade cloth was all black and melted. She made several phone calls while we waited there for Dad to come back home. She had to pull me back from the fence a couple of times as I was trying to see what was going on in the basement, or if there was any indication of what happened to the RV.
He didn't come for us, though. A helicopter finally arrived to pick us up and take us away, but Dad wasn't in it. Mom gave me the option to stay or go. I wanted to stay, and find out what was going on below the house. I didn't tell her that part, of course. As we turned to leave, armed frog-faced men jumped out of the helicopter, I thought they were armed with spear guns, tridents in them, and Mom shouted at me to run. I ran. The frogmen got mom and the helicopter took off to try to follow me.
I had an almost overwhelming urge to leap down into the tunnel and run to the altar, but it was too far to jump and I came to my senses at the last second. I took my jacket off as I ran into some bushes. Wrapping it around a stone like my friend EA had once done, I tossed it down the hillside. The helicopter followed it. I snuck back up and over the other side of the hill. I picked up Mom's purse. It had several hundred dollars in it, and lots of expensive looking jewelry. I took the whole thing with me.
On the other side of the hill I ran into Raven, from Teen Titans. She wasn't really Raven, just looked like her. She started to teach me how to manipulate the shadows and to find the fear in mortal minds. Suddenly Mom was back, inside my head, telling me to turn away from the Dark Side. I thanked Raven for showing me her skills, said I didn't know if they would be useful to me and wished her luck. She kissed me on top of the head, having to get on tiptoe to do so. I hadn't realized until then that she was actually shorter than me. It was weird to realize that there was an adult, shorter than me (meaning that there may have been more than one.)
I continued down the far side of my hill until I made it into town. I found a small hotel with no one parked outside. I conned my way into a room, saying my mom had given me her credit card and wallet to reserve us a room while she was interviewing for a job. I used the card to reserve the room and went and let myself in. I spent the night frightened and jumpy. I awoke just at first light. I left, without checking out. I just wrote a note saying we had to leave in a hurry, and carefully forged my mom's signature from her driver's license. I didn't want to use up my cash. I made my way back up the hill. Dad was at the top of the basement. No sign of any helicopters. He was very sad looking, and his face was puffed up in a way that made him look a little like the frogmen. It was obvious he'd been crying, a lot.
He spotted me and signaled me to stay hidden. He opened his wallet and dropped all his cash on the ground as he walked past where I was hiding. He also dropped a pair of tickets for a train to Denver.
"Run away, far away." he croaked through his tears. He then jumped down into the basement. I grabbed the money, but couldn't run away yet. I made my way over to where I could see down the tunnel. Dad vanished into the room, and the altar flashed.
The room vanished, the basement wall back to what I'd remembered, though strange for being sunlit. I suddenly knew I wouldn't see either of them again. Dad's wallet was laying on the ground near the edge, like he knew I would follow rather than running away. I scooped it up and ran down into the town, planning on buying clothing and jewelry with the credit cards and then destroying them before getting on the train. I knew, however, that I would be back to find out what was going on with the altar and the hidden room.
Braiding Hair.
I was at a Fantasy Faire event, SO was there with her curly shiny coppery hair. She wanted me to braid it on one side only. Three strands, 60, 30, and 10 percent. OK. It made for a sort of chunky looking braid, but it did work and looked pretty cool when it was done. Sort of Sci-Fi. Later I ran into her and she'd asked N and CH to make little braids from the other side to sort of hold up the left hand loose hair. She'd come back to me to ask me to make them connect in to her big braid to act like a sort of hair net. Somehow I managed to make that work. By the time the dream was over I was wishing I was about 20 years younger.
Ad astra per technica,
fermius
posted by Fermius Firefly | 8:47 AM
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