Other Worldly Fall Through

I had one of those dreams that would take far longer to relate than it did to have. Myself and my cell phone were out for a walk when I crested a low ridge and fell right over the other side onto a different world.

I could tell it was different by how light I was, and the fact that the sky was full of nebulae and stars so close you could see they were small disks. There were no grasses, only broad leafed plants with leaves that turned to follow the brightest parts of the sky. I had no cell reception at all, so I turned off the phone completely to conserve the battery.

I wandered around a bit, coming across a path, whether made intentionally or a game trail of some sort, I couldn't tell. I moved down hill, figuring at least that might lead to water, eventually. The scents in the air were very purple and orange, with a touch of brine every so often. Insects flitted about, but I didn't see or hear any birds. There didn't seem to be any plants over about twelve feet tall, either. Everything had a pretty manicured look to it, though, so I began to think I'd wandered into some sort of garden.

I made my way down to the bottom of the trail, which curved along the edge of a steep slope. I looked over the slope and below me stretched out a nearly endless expanse of land and oceans. I knew in an instant it was a world far larger, and far different than our own little globe. As far as I could tell, it extended into every direction, blending in with the grey black of the sky. I could tell the little world I was currently on rotated slowly about an axis that would make this little trail eventually level or even feel like it was the top of the hill. I headed back away from the edge, hoping to find some signs of habitation.

I came across a camp of about thirty people. As soon as I entered the camp they asked what I was sent up for. It was a language that I had never heard before, so I don't know how I understood the question, nor how they would understand my answer.

I told them that I actually fell down. That was apparently the wrong thing to say as they all drew small makeshift weapons and advanced on me. As they drew close I noticed that they weren't all human, many of them had triangular ears and tails, puffs of fur grew from their cheeks like a lion's mane, and some even had whiskers and small flat noses.

"Look," I said "this is where I came from." I turned on my phone and opened up the photo gallery to show the pictures of myself and the kitties. That actually stopped them. They had never seen anything like it.

I tried to explain that it wasn't magic and the battery was not going to last long if I couldn't get back to my home to charge it.

They conferred a long time, and decided that I was some sort of wizard, and they really didn't want me there messing up their balanced society. Apparently they were all exiled here from the world below, they'd managed to scrape together enough resources to stay alive, but they were stuck as jumping off the world would likely be fatal, and they had received some supplies from below, as occasionally someone had jumped off and survived. The occasional survivor sneaked to the catapult that had put them there and fired up news and goods. The reports were also that survivors who returned to their home area were executed if caught. They knew this because their bodies had been launched up to the rock as a stern warning not to try it. I realized that the only people I could understand, and who understood me were the cat people. They had some sort of limited telepathy, it seemed.

They debated whether to strip me and take my stuff before throwing me off the rock, and during that debate I slipped away, heading to the edge of the rock, again. surveying the world below. Apparently that was not what they were expecting, as they headed for the uplands and the forests and caves to search for me. (At least what I could hear from when they discovered I was missing.) I would guess the whole rock was nor more than six or seven miles around, so a few square miles of fairly verdant territory. I found an area where there was a makeshift "Dock" at the edge of the rock. I guessed that this was the proposed drop-off point. I looked out over the edge and saw a huge water filled crater almost directly below me. I was really thinking a hang glider would come in handy right now. The sun came up, or, more precisely, the rock rotated into a position where the fiery globe in the sky that was this world's sun could reach where I was on the rock. I could see that there was a ladder on the side of the platform, so I climbed down. It turned under the rock and led down to a small ledge. I realized that if I slid down the ladder, and let go before the ledge I would be aimed right at the crater lake below the rock. So, not knowing what possessed me to do so, I let myself slide down below the rock and then let go as I neared the ledge.

Something in the mass above me seemed to counter my weight, and I didn't fall nearly as fast as I thought I would so I realized I was in danger of overshooting the lake below. I opened up my shirt and tried to use it as an air brake. That was partly successful, but wouldn't really have been effective. What was effective, however, was the force holding the rock up in the sky, it seemed to pull me into an orbit, or more accurately, a falling spiral centered on the crater lake below. My only regret now was that I had no way to protect my cell phone from getting wet. I balled it up in my shirt as best I could.

I don't remember hitting the water, but I woke in the bottom of a small boat, my shirt and phone balled up on my chest. I unwrapped it, and the inner folds of cloth were still dry. I couldn't have been in the water long.

"We fished it out first, it seemed really important to you." One of the fishing cats communicated to me quietly.

I thanked her. They dropped me off on the shore outside of a town before heading to their own village.

I looked up the street and realized that most of the signs were just pictures, but the few that contained text were completely unrecognizable.

I wandered up the street, looking at the various shops, realized that my cards and what little money I had were not likely to be worth anything here. I greeted folks as I walked, and they were friendly enough, but it was clear that no one but the cat folk were able to understand me, and even then it only seemed to be a fairly small subset of them.

I came upon what looked like a large town hall. I looked around for a seat, figuring I would just sit and watch for awhile, try to get a sense of the society, the way things work. It was pretty crowded and I eventually found myself in a little rectangular pen like area with several open stools. I sat in one, just to catch my breath and get my bearings a little bit. It was obvious after just a short while of looking around that the more cat-like cat people tended to be the less well off looking. There was a good spectrum of wealth shown among all the peoples there, but there were a couple of obvious trends like that.

I finally decided that I needed to move up to the gallery with the "poorer" folks, in the hopes that I would get some inkling of what was going on. Unfortunately, I had sat down in the "Defendants Paddock" and was no longer allowed to leave. I tried to explain what had happened but folks just laughed at me. A bailiff made me sit back down.

The judge/mayor came in, a red-haired woman who, oddly, I could mostly understand, even though she didn't look much like a cat person. I just assumed her words were so reinforced by the cat folk in the audience that I was getting them as a sort of telepathic overflow effect. There were a half dozen "cases" on the docket, not all of them criminal matters, some were civil matters. The Judge went through all of them, and then looked up to see me sitting there after all her files were done.

"Who are you?" she asked, and I could tell it WAS her that I was understanding.

When she realized that her audience couldn't understand me, and had begun wondering how she could, she had the bailiff remove me from the room.

I ended up in the police station, but not in a cell. It was obvious that I wasn't allowed to leave, but otherwise they brought me lunch and a light blanket when it started to get chilly. The evening shift came in, and one of the officers was a cat woman who was able to talk to me. The Judge arrived shortly after my interview with the officer.

The conversation, and another meal, was quite pleasant, and the Judge was pleasant, but very obviously concerned about my story. I could tell that she wasn't really willing to believe it, until I showed her the pictures on my phone, which sputtered and died after a few moments. It apparently had gotten some water in it after all. I had to convince her it wasn't magic, or at least no more so than the fact that we could understand one another.

After our long conversation about where I was from, she pointed out that she could have me arrested for being a vagrant, as I had no money and no place to stay. I could see she was weighing her options when the feline police officer rescued me, saying she had a spare room and I could stay there and help with the dogs until I found other work.

By the time the officers shift was done, I was bone tired and barely remembered the route to her home. I fell into her too small guest bed, and immediately fell to dreaming. (All I remember from the dream within this dream was sitting next to a busty woman in a blue linen jacket, immaculately tailored and with very shiny silver buttons.)

In the morning I got up and helped prepare the breakfast table and then washed up afterwards. Shortly after that the officer got up and took me out to where the dogs were. They were huge, about the height of a pony or small horse. She explained that the puppies were pretty tame, but their mother was still very feral.

She was indeed, and much larger than her children, the father of the puppies must not have been a particularly large specimen. I looked into the mother's eyes and immediately knew that she was much smarter than her handlers were giving her credit for. I jumped down into her pit. There were calls of alarm from the others, but we approached one another and greeted one another. I rubbed her face and ears and then took off the choke/spike chain from around her neck. She stood up and stretched. Then sat, looking at me. I gave her a roll I'd been saving from breakfast. I started walking her around the pit, stopping when she started to pull. (A lot like when walking J's dog Lucy.) We eventually jumped out of the pit and took a stroll around the grounds. The other handlers followed us with weapons and ropes, ready for her to make a break for it. I could tell she wouldn't as she wanted to stay close to her puppies. She kept looking at me like I was going to try to ride her, but I just ruffled her neck fur, gently rubbing down the injuries where the spikes had dug under her coat. Eventually we made our way back to the pit, and she willingly ran down the ramp and stretched out to nurse her newest litter of puppies.

I made sure I had more treats for her after dinner. As I walked out to the pit to feed her, the Judge fell into step with me. I was surprised to see her. As we walked, I realized that she was a cat person. "Did it hurt when your ears were docked?"

Her hand flew up to her ear, hidden by a tiara/turban sort of headdress, then she dropped it quickly looking around to make sure no one had seen. I also guessed that her bustle hid the fact that she had a tail, or at least the stub of a tail. I immediately felt sad for her. She could tell. I promised I wouldn't say anything, as her people adored her and were obviously prospering under her leadership.

Her conversation with me indicated that she would be much happier if I didn't stay in the area, and after seeing me feeding the "feral bitch" she lit upon the "perfect solution." When the puppies were weaned, I would take the dog and leave for a stint in the wilderness, find a feral mate for her so her puppies would be full sized next time. She also indicated that she would not be broken up if the two of us didn't return. Ever.

I told her that would be difficult, as I too was rather fond of the people of her village. I promised I would consider it, though. That seemed to strike her as true, and I realized than that the telepathy was much stronger between people who shared common passions. I think that very much disturbed her, but she knew I was serious about not being a threat to her village so she was content to let me free, but keep a close eye on me.

The dream continued on for quite some time. One night I went to a dance, like our English Country Dancing, except I had to learn the calls in a different language. I tried to dance with the cat women, as most of them could tell me the right (or left) way to go. It was a lot of fun, and everyone had good humor about my lumbering attempts to be graceful.

Another evening we had a huge bonfire and barbecue with story telling. Again I had to have "translators" for several of the stories. I showed my hippo photograph and described the San Diego Zoo. I tried to draw a picture of a giraffe, and that got everyone laughing.  I worked with the dogs, including the feral mom.

Eventually the dog and I were out working with the police, tracking large animals who'd broken into some chicken coops, or chasing after a lost child, or just patrolling the village after dark with my hostess. However, I never rode her like the police rode her grown puppies. It suited us fine. (It was then that I noticed that I was easily fourteen inches taller than any of the villagers, and bigger than all but the blacksmiths and warrior types.) I had little trouble keeping up with the pack, even when they were running. (They were a little faster, but I could run far longer.)

At some point my hostess actually paid me, and then told me about the kingdom'c bright city center, where there were rumors of magic looking glasses like my own, and people who know how to make them work again. I wasn't sure mine would fully recover from the water damage, but when I powered it up, it did come up, and there was no crackling. Still no signal, though. I agreed that a trip to the capitol was probably in order, so we spent my wages on outfitting me and the dog for travel. I was amazed when she allowed me to put a puppy backpack on her, but she seemed to be excited about the trip, too.

This was the point where I woke. I really didn't want to, as I wanted to find out more about this interesting world.

Gremlin Catastrophe

I dreamed I was a Gremlin (thanks ET and Elizabeth, I'm certain) on a
chunk of floating planet. Unfortunately, not the sort of Gremlin with
magical powers, so perhaps more like Goblins. The chunk was a huge
volcanic mountain with chambers in the formerly molten core. There were
close to seven hundred survivors who'd made it underground and managed
to seal off the caves to preserve both water and air. A nuclear power
plant provided energy and heat as well as the power to
electromagnetically shield the living areas, sort of.

The chunk of planet we were on was large enough to provide a bare
minimum of gravity, so we had pipes going to the former surface of our
world, dredging up as much plant and animal life as would fit, along
with air and water before it completely boiled away. I didn't know that
we could actually survive for long, as we'd already lost a couple of our
grow lights, and the replacement stock was very small, only about half a
dozen lamps.

I calculated, with the rest of the survival team, that we had all of
about a year and a half to survive on stored supplies, so our plant and
animal (insects, mostly) growing was going to have to be an incredible
success in order for us to last any longer.

We were apparently a few months into this when I was elected to
represent the non-scientific community of survivors, even though it was
partly my process that had hollowed out the air tight spheres in the
magma.

One of the groups major desires was to get radio working, in case there
were other survivors out there. Even though the science team was not
sure that was truly useful, they agreed to allow some small expenditure
of resources to construct the antenna on the surface. My survivors had
to make the environment suits, though, and provide the technicians. I
volunteered as did another.

The suits were hand made from donated and scavenged materials brought
back by the robotic vacuums that roamed the surface. Meanwhile, we came
up with a way of coiling the antenna wires and then throwing them out to
make up the antenna array. We practiced a few times in one of the
larger lava spheres, one that was partly open to the surface and
therefore nearly a vacuum. We discovered some small snags in the plan,
the wires would sometimes kink up and loop around, causing waves to
build up in them and then they would break. I requested a robot to haul
the lines around, but was denied, as the science team wanted to preserve
the batteries for emergency use. There were a number of technological
item that we weren't going to be able to replace anytime soon, if ever.

The other volunteer and I talked about the plan, and we decided that
rather than just popping out to the surface and tossing the wires
around, one of us would roll out the wires. It meant a couple of hours
of outside time, rather than just a few minutes. It may have been
chauvinistic of me, but I insisted that I should be the one to roam,
partly because I was stronger, and partly because I was actually
smaller.

We made the trip to the surface and one of the science council members
brought me a spare oxygen tank on the sly. That was going to make a huge
difference, adding at least another couple of hours of hard labor time
to the task (presuming no leaks.) We stepped out onto the surface from
the elevator air lock. The night sky was fantastically clear, I could
see the molten remains of the planet spiraling out away from us, the sun
was glinting off of the fragments of the world, many of which still
glowed white hot from whatever had sundered our planet. I saw that there
were some larger chunks still floating whole, and they looked as though
they might have splashes of light on them.

Whether the light was just from the fires of destruction, or signs of
other survivors, we couldn't tell, but were hoping to find out. I ran
the wires out across the surface in long bounds, maintaining tension the
on the wire enough to keep it from kinking. I anchored each end on a
glass insulting stake and we crisscrossed the crater with wire, then put
the receiver up at the focus of the makeshift parabolic antenna. With
about half an hour of air to spare we headed back for the elevator when
there was a huge burst of static on our walkie-talkies.

We looked up. Overhead was a huge blue and green fragment hanging in a
white circle of white hot debris. It was larger than our little
planetoid, and, unfortunately closing fast. I was actually more
concerned about the antenna's survival than my own. We raced back to the
airlock, telling the people below to brace themselves, something large
was coming. It wasn't until we got back below that we found out how
large.

The science council was in our little radio room, crowded around our
small speaker, chattering excitedly to someone about the inbound portal.


I was confused.

The white hot debris wasn't debris, but an interstellar portal, one that
had been poorly aimed, one that had accidentally ripped through our
world. I was a little upset to know that the council had known about the
portal. (Thus why they had been so eager to deploy our magma bubble
process all around the world.) They were now communicating with the
portal's owners on the other side, negotiating a rescue.

The rescue consisted of pulling part of our hunk of planet through the
wormhole, and dropping it onto a world that was being terraformed. We
would be evacuated to a large stable mesa on the planet, several hundred
rescue bags were being delivered to the surface above the large empty
bubble we had used as our rehearsal room. Several thousand more were
waiting to be delivered as we discovered and located other survivors.
The wormhole was a large version of the small vacuum hose carrying
robots we'd been using to scavenge up our survival supplies. Only it
sucked up planets and deposited them on this huge framework of a world,
to which we were going to be delivered as well.

I started rounding up the survivors and getting them to the hallways
leading to the large sphere, I was soon suited up again, and hauling
large silvery spring loaded bags into the bubble, where they rolled
slowly down to the bottom of the sphere next to the door. My partner and
I then rolled the bags into the airlock, where a family would grab one
and head out to the elevator. From there, like a large hamster ball, the
family would roll the bag out to the former parking lot of the facility.
We had to them all there in just a few hours. I don't know how we did
it, but we did.

A lobe of the portal swooped down and they, and the parking lot, were
gone. A few minutes later, we heard them shouting and cheering over the
radio, they had made it.

The two of us who'd stayed behind, though, to manage the communications
with other survivors, were not going to be so fortunate. Until my
partner remembered that there was an airfield nearby. We said our
goodbyes over the radio, then suited up one last time. We bounded across
the remains of the facility, watching the portal grow ever larger. We
found the airport, and most of the planes were a jumbled mess, but there
in a chunk of asphalt was a small bi-wing, staked to the ground. My
partner squeezed into the open cockpit, then I released all of the
tie-downs. I took the longest one with me.

There was an electric cart nearby, I stuck the nose wheel tie down in
its grill and started it up, then jammed the accelerator. I managed to
climb onto the wing and then into the front cockpit. The tie-down went
taut, and we started rolling along behind the little cart.

Since there was little atmosphere by this point, I had no actual
steering control, so just hoped the little cart would roll off the end
of the long slap of concrete and asphalt with enough speed to pull us
out, off the mountainside, and then through the portal well in front of
the mass of planet behind us. Well, that was the plan, anyway.

The little cart hit a bump, and bounced up off the tarmac. It rotated
and struck the ground on its two right wheels. It scooted forward a bit,
then teetered over onto its side. The tie-down strap went slack. The
cart was sliding to a stop, directly in front of us. I climbed out and
pushed on the right wing, then tried to keep pushing, but the low
gravity made getting traction difficult. I managed to tilt the wing up
and over the cart, then had to struggle to catch back up to the plane. I
dug my feet in and pushed hard, trying to stay on the ground and push at
the same time.

We approached the end of the tarmac, where much of the mountain had
fallen away. The small plane tipped up slightly as it bumped over the
shallow ridge the defined the broken runway, and momentum carried it
over the edge. I jumped after it, overtaking it, and several feet above
it. My partner had pulled in the tie-down strap and tossed it out in
front of me.

We hit the surface of the portal, and there was atmosphere. The plane
stalled beneath me and I grabbed the end of the strap. I shot over the
top wing and my fall pulled the plane's nose down, breaking the stall.
We fell, I pulled myself up the strap, watching the first bit of the
mountain hit the surface of the portal, and explode into fire. It was
gaining on us.

"Start the engine!" I shouted, but my partner waited until I was past
the engine and hanging on to the wing struts before trying.

I could feel the heat above us. The engine sputtered. I prayed that the
fuel system was sealed enough for the fuel to still exist. I worried
that the lubrication of the motor might have boiled away in the vacuum.
The propeller turned and I dove head first into the cockpit, trying not
to hit the flight controls as I tucked myself into the flight harness. I
put us into a slight roll and tried to aim for the nearest edge of the
mass being torn up by the portal. Small bits of debris pinged off the
hull and wings around us. The plane lurched as the engine coughed and
sputtered, cutting into the thin air enough to pull us forward.

Our radio crackled to life, the council asking what was going on. "Hell
raining down on this world, how do we get to you?" I asked, but there
was no reply, just repeated calls for updates on the situation. I
realized they must be out of our radio's range.

There was no answer for several seconds, long enough for us to steer
away from the debris falling past us, and soon any answer was blocked
out by intense static interference. I started looking for signs of life,
but there were none, deep canyons and crevasses with an odd silvery gray
framework were slowly being covered by molten rock that seared the sky
and crashed behind us with continuous shock waves that pushed us on the
front of a roasting wave of heat that made controlling the plane
difficult. We dove for well over a minute, our planet roaring through
the portal, being sucked to its final location a bit at a time as it
ground against the portal's surface, torn and collapsing to the ground
far below.

As we got closer to the ground I could see signs of plant life in the
distance, and we both decided to head in that direction, even though, as
far as we knew, we might be flying in exactly the wrong direction.
Clouds blotted out the sun and lighting arced all around us. The heat
began to be unbearable, our little suit batteries finally starting to
run down. We put the plane into a dive, building up our airspeed to the
red-line. My partner let me fly while she tried to find something on the
radio other than static. I told her to try the walkie-talkies, too.

There was nothing, however, but static and heat. At least both tanks
read "full" and when we got lower the air was cooler and smoother. I
spotted several lakes and meandering rivers in the distance and gently
nudged the plane in that direction, we needed to find flat ground to set
down on if we ever expected to be able to take off again. Problem with
grassy fields is that you couldn't see how bumpy they might be from the
air, so a long stretch of gravel shoreline seemed like a better plan. I
found myself wishing we'd looked for a float plane.

The radio crackled and sputtered, but we could make out our council,
we'd been flying in mostly the right direction, to judge by the Vortac
radios, once I got them tuned to the same frequency.

I wondered how their radio was working at that distance, but it dawned
on me that we were probably using a radio from the group that killed our
world. I flew for a few minutes about ninety degrees to our former
course and then took another bead on the radio. The lines were very
nearly parallel, either their radio was moving, or we were hundreds of
miles from their location.

The dream jumped ahead several days. We'd set a lean-too up using the
wing of the plane as a roof. We'd apparently just about run out of fuel,
and were only using the engine to charge the batteries to keep the radio
going. (I figured we could listen about an hour a day for the next five
months or so.)

We'd heard other survivors on the radio, even managed to talk a few
moments to some of them as they passed so far overhead that we couldn't
see them, so knew our little group wasn't the only one that survived. I
kept a fire burning and hoped that someone would fly over and see our
bright yellow plane from the air. We'd managed to find grain and fruit
that was edible, as well as some fish-like things. (Information from the
radio helped identify animals that were safe.) My partner was confident
that rescue would only be a matter of waiting for the collection of our
planet to cease, then the aliens would be able to fly out and pick us
up, they were too busy rescuing others at the moment.

Another time jump. We were indeed rescued, but had to leave the plane
behind. I took the radios and the battery, though, just in case. I was
in a group that was overlooking the deposited remains of our world,
still molten and glowing, but with odd bits of other planes and loose
remnants of debris that had somehow been cast out from the periphery of
the storm and littered about this new world. I'd found some old phone
bills, along with the other papers that had somehow survived the intense
heat, or been blown away from the cataclysm.

It was all sort of depressing. The aliens were very tall, about two to
two and a half times our size, but oddly similar in construction. They
didn't have tails, though. They were very, very, sorry; and seemed to be
doing everything they could to rescue whatever populations they had
found still alive, they had even turned over their pre-built colonies to
us. Still, from a world of several billion souls, we now numbered only
in the thousands.

I looked down at the pile of papers I had collected and then let them
drop from the ledge I was standing on. They fluttered down into the
still molten remains of our old world and vanished in a series of
flashes. I hoisted my radio pack and headed back to our observation
tower.

Stumble Bum

Dinner did not agree with me, so the aches and pains insinuated themselves into my dreams as a random falling and bruising myself.

I have no idea what was supposed to be happening in the dream, but every time I tried to get up someplace, even as simple as pulling myself up onto the throne (a loveseat sized futon given to us by one of N's ex-Navy buddies) or the retaining wall, I would snag something, clothing, hand, foot, shoelace, etc. I would then and stumble and fall, always managing to land on something uncomfortable, the exercise machine, barbells, retaining wall, broken clay pots, thorn bushes....

Alien Turnover, Lost Charges

Tumbling at LH's house to end up down in the canyon with aliens attacking overhead. The fun part of this dream was the detail and excitement of trying to keep upright and out from under tumbling furniture as the house was turned over with unusual slowness and care. Like the aliens were turning over a rock looking for something underneath.

In fact, the aliens were still making their way along the ridge line turning over houses as they went.


At a theater conference awards show, trying to find the group I'd been asked to chaperone. Since I didn't actually know any of the kids, I couldn't figure out where they were seated.

Waterfall from Space

              I dreamed I was driving out in the desert with N and the H's when the sky opened up and burst into flame. The radio reported that a giant comet had struck the moon and its cloud of water particles were on their way to earth. No one knew what would happen. That didn't keep the radio personalities from speculating. We decided to stop for the night, as the moon came up we could see it surrounded by fire and white steam. Meteors from the ejecta of the lunar collision poured into the earth a couple of hours ahead of its progress across the sky. One particularly large fireball raced overhead and impacted somewhere in the desert ahead of us.
              The hotel tilted and pitched us out of our beds. I started tying the sheets together at their corners so we could use them at a rope to climb back out. We managed to get out of the hotel just as it slipped over the lip of a great sink hole, or crater. I tied the four corners of the four sheet construction to the back of N's car, and we all got in.
              The water followed the fire. The sky became an opaque gray and the temperature steamy. Rocks and ice pelted the car, cracking the windshield and denting the roof. It began to pour, the water coming in great streaming sheets, rather than individual drops. Soon we were being floated along the desert at a high rate of speed. I managed to pull up our sheet parachute and soon it was acting as a kind of air brake, causing us to be pulled about half the speed of the current, as the wind was blowing away from the direction of the water flow.
              We were swept, none the less, over the edge of the great crater. We tied ourselves together with the bungee net from the back of N's car, and abandoned the car. The makeshift parachute held, and the strong updrafts from the steam filled center of the crater aided in keeping us aloft. We spotted an island like uplift in the center of the rapidly filling crater, and best as we could tried to steer for it.
              We landed in the very hot water just about twenty yards from the island, A and I gathered up the ropes and sheets as we didn't know what resources, if any we would have other than what we landed with. We swam for the island, which itself was only visible because of the strong onshore breeze. The island was too hot to climb out onto, so we paddled out a little farther from it until the waters could cool the thing off. All around us was a giant waterfall that just didn't stop.
              We floated for what seemed like hours. By then we'd drifted around the island and found a warm but not too warm place to land. There were other people on the island by then, and a couple of them had drifted in with their cars. We rigged the sheets between the cars to make a somewhat dry place, as the rain was still pouring down out of the sky as the water was pouring over the rim of the crater.
              When the rain let up I noticed that there was a large open area, with lights and buildings in the side of the crater wall. We swam over. It was part of an underground facility of some sort. While the people there weren't thrilled to see us all, they did agree to let us dry off and fed us while we awaited rescue.

Leaf Flotilla, Saving Goblins

              I dreamed I was sitting along the edge of a small pond accompanied by some of my nieces and nephews. In the dream, they were all Gnomes. I had found a green leaf that was perfectly shaped for a hull. With a little tearing and bending, I was able to mount a sail in the middle of it and set it down on the surface of the pond. A few moments later, a gentle puff of wind filled the little sail and the boat headed out on its adventure across the pond.
              One of my nephews reached up to pull off a fresh leaf from a nearby tree. I stopped him. "You can only use the leaves that have fallen. It was a long winter, the trees need every leaf they can hold on to."
              "Sometimes you sound more like a druid than a wizard." One of my nieces complained.
              Soon a small two masted schooner and a lateen rigged sloop joined our little flotilla. I began to wonder what the smallest nephew was doing that was taking so long. I turned to make sure he wasn't in any sort of trouble and spotted a four masted ketch with a spinnaker and spanker. Soon it had caught up with our little flotilla and barged through the midst of them and headed rapidly for the far shore of the pond.
              "Pretty amazing for a guy who hates to take time to prepare for anything."
              "This is shipbuilding, you can't just slap anything together..."
              "Like I did?"
              "Uh, oh...." At least my nephew had the courtesy to blush.
             
              I later dreamed that I was flying on the back of a dragon, swooping through the air, enjoying the thermals and the conversation with the dragon when we heard shouts for help.
              My dragon tucked his wings in tight and we rolled over into a dive. There were four goblins in a dirigible being harassed by black-clad raiders mounted on griffin back. The dirigible was flying neutral colors, and I couldn't tell who the raiders were.
              "Protect the goblins, She requests it." The dragon roared over the wind.
              I popped a spell that yanked me out of my seat, and as I drifted on an interception course with the dirigible, I righted myself, and began to cast "living bomb" on each of the raiders as they flew into range.
              I missed the dirigible, but it was soon falling with me. I managed to hit a couple of the goblins with slow fall, one jumped ship in rocket boots and I fell next to a couple of others. Cancelling my own spell to catch up to them so I could cast slow fall on each of them. Unfortunately, that put me perilously close to the ground. I didn't have time to slow myself again, so felt the frozen depths of the nether and encased myself in a block of nether ice. I felt nothing when I slammed into the ground. I tilted a bit where the ground gave way beneath me. I saw the goblins drifting in closer, and a couple of the raiders diving after them. I felt the Living Bombs go off and felt the echo of their heat. I released the nether ice and used the heat to send blast after blast after each of the remaining raiders. At this point I could feel myself hitting the keys to play the game (World of Warcraft) and soon I was watching the action on a computer screen rather than living it. Kind of a let down that pulled me out of the dream pretty quickly.

Plains, Studio, Falling Damage, Forest Flowers

              The first dream of the evening has all ready grown dim in my memory, even the title I thought of to recall it by has vanished. All I remember is low rolling hills covered in a golden shimmering coat of grain, and silvery streams running between them. I was with a group of people and we were mounted on some sort of animal or machine that soared a few feet off the ground at a speed just a little bit faster than a run. We were laughing and chatting, excited to be on our way somewhere for some special event.

              I dreamed I had converted the entire upstairs room into a library/studio. The photo backdrops were on rollers in front of the book cases, for when I didn't want to use the book cases as a backdrop. I had a couple of large digital cameras and a rather wide array of lights and reflectors. My desk was up there as well, the entire surface having been replaced by a large bright touch screen. One wall had several framed photos, and a couple of painting from those photos. LA had done those, I think. There were also a few framed magazine covers as well. I had opened up a skylight in the roof and was having someone use a crane to lower a bunch of potted plants into the studio. A couple of models were walking around in robes, waiting for the clothing lines to go away.

              I dreamed I was playing with a large group of people in a very elaborate setting. There were multiple platforms and the 25 or so of us were fighting the main boss of the dungeon. I was Axelpyre, and was trying to stay out of the way and at my maximum range, as the boss was one of those who randomly charged his attackers before going back to the tanks.
              At a later point in the fight, he became invulnerable, and starts stomping random party members. The raid leader wanted everyone to distribute themselves to the various platforms around the main platform in hopes of keeping him on the main platform with the tanks. I noticed that when he attacked someone who was standing on one of the flower designs, the damage was shared with whoever else was on the flower designs. I asked everyone to jump back down to the main platform and stand on one of the flowers. I jumped first. I managed to pull him off the platform. He fell and I landed, by blinking at the last second. I was hurt, but alive. I started bandaging myself. The rest of the raid hurried to position themselves before the boss could climb his way back up to us. When he got to us he was at about 10%, apparently his immunity didn't apply to falling damage.
              “Make sure to add that to your recount posting,” I whispered the Raid Assistant.
              She sent back a “:P”
              I popped all my defensive buffs and the boss jumped me. Everyone took about 400 damage.
              “It's working, Oh! My gods! It's working!” the raid leader shouted.
              “I wonder if this works even after this phase?” a priest added. (It didn't.)
              The boss attacked a half dozen more times, each time the damage was spread across the raid.
              Soon the boss went back to his normal attack, targeting me. Apparently, the fall damage was on my aggro account. “See you in a few!” I shouted and popped my invisibility. When I reappeared, he was at about two percent and I managed to only get off a half dozen casts before we had him down completely.
              “Maybe we should try that again before Blizzard fixes it.”
              “Are you kidding, that was sheer luck,” I said.
              “Come on, let's at least try it!” came a chorus of voices.
              “OK, Tuesday night, we're on again.”
              I opened a portal for everyone and as they ducked out they each whispered their congratulations, and condolences; the boss hadn't dropped any caster loot.
              About ten minutes into making repairs and putting stuff on the auction house I began to get whispers and invites from people I didn't even know. Apparently one of the raid members had recorded the whole thing, and had already posted it on line.

              In another dream, I found myself walking alone in the forest, it was spring, and the path was covered with tiny green shoots. Vines, covered with flowers, honeysuckle and roses, mostly, crawled along the path and veered left and right into the forest itself. I could make out the remains of a low stone wall on either side of the path, the walls were completely knocked down in some places, in other places there were obvious drain features, and in others gateways, with the gates long rotted off their hinges. On a whim I stepped through one of the gateways and followed a much overgrown path into the forest, there was even a four inch diameter tree growing from in between the cobblestones.
              After a minor tussle with a blackberry bush, I managed to come to what had been the front lawn of a small cottage. The cottage itself was still standing, but covered from top to bottom with flowering vines. I recognized bougainvillea and honeysuckle, there were old porch posts that now looked like tree trunks, they supported a dizzying amount of wisteria. The effect was like looking at a faerie castle instead of an abandoned cottage.
              I walked around the cottage, noting that the windows had been shuttered when it was abandoned, as though someone thought they might be coming back to the place. I listened to the wind rustling the flowers, and found myself thinking that you could almost make out voices. I had just decided to try to make my way inside when the phone rang.
             

Flu Dreams

       I have been quite sick, and that always leads to some interesting dream. Unfortunately, that is also coupled with no desire to sit and record those dreams. Here is what I remember, though, from the past few days.

       N and I were walking along a narrow bit of blacktop in an eerily abandoned seeming bit of woods and broken down homes. The air was still, no sounds of birds or insects, some small bit of heat coming from the roadway kept the chill in the air from being too severe. As we strolled I spotted a bright orange cone sticking out of the roadway. The cone was small, about three quarters of a centimeter across and a centimeter tall. As I drew near I saw that the last couple of millimeters of the cone was silvery. There was a sudden crack! Simultaneous with a zing! The crack was the cone bouncing past my ribs and lodging in my shoulder blade. I think I experienced the crack first as it was inside my body, while the zing was outside.
       I fell in a hump on the ground, consciousness fading away. N leaned down over me to see what was the matter. I couldn't catch my breath to warn N, I could see that there were dozens of the little cones on the road in the direction we were headed.

       A couple of nights later, I dreamed I was trying to get across the stage in between acts of a talent show. I would wait for the lights to dim, and then make my way to another set piece. It took me a couple of acts to make it across the stage. When I got there, I was greeted by some visiting dignitaries, and my boss. I described the recent improvements to the theater, and suggested that we could walk around outside to get to the dimmer rack and the new stage manager's tablet workstation on the other side of the stage, as the students were in the middle of a performance.
       "Nonsense, follow me," my boss said and led the group across the stage behind a dance routine/air band performance.
       I apologized to the assistant stage manager and went around the outside during the catcalling and laughter from the audience. When I got there my boss was angry that I hadn't warned him that there was an audience. I could tell that he really felt he hadn't been warned, but the rest of the dignitaries seemed to look at me with understanding. The stage manager was one of my former students, now in her mid twenties and with that slender but solid adult look that teens can only wish for. She greeted me warmly and demonstrated how she was in contact with the control booth in the back of the house to call the shots for the lighting and special effects queues. My boss wanted her to show off the special chase effects and the computer program used to create the light queues, but both she and I reminded him that there was a show going on. (Now there was a dramatic scene being performed by lip-syncing dialog read by audience participants.) I could tell my boss was disappointed. I had recommended against this particular timing in our planning meetings.

       This morning's dream was much more abstract, all shifting planes of various blues and greens, with a bright orange and yellow ribbon that wove around and through a multitude of the planes.
       There was music, the "Macarena" I think it was, and the sensation of other beings flowing along the ribbon with me, all looking to debark into their own particular blue or green plane. I had no idea how I was supposed to locate my particular plane, or even if I was moving in the right direction. A fellow traveller, or perhaps a passing thought, indicated that the ribbon was infinite. With some anxiety, I realized that it would be very easy to go too far in a direction. Though, thankfully, the ribbon seemed to be pretty much one dimensional, with no directions to go but forward and back. I could see indications of other ribbons woven through the planes, but knew, or was told, that you had to enter a plane to transfer to one of them. So I should easily be able to get back to the right plane simply by zig-zagging back and forth a little further afield each time on this same ribbon. I was fairly certain that I hadn't gotten off the ribbon I'd started on. I turned around and the "Macarena" got louder, so I felt that I was now headed in the right direction.

Fever Dreams

       Last night was a tossing and turning sort of night (I have some sort of bug) that had tossing and turning sorts of dreams. At least partly inspired by our newfound World Of Warcraft hobby, I found myself being wrapped up in vines and unable to escape.
       In other tossing and turning moments, I was falling off of a balcony at a hotel of some sort, trying to swim through the air on the way down to get to the pool. That really didn't work. Woke with a full body convulsion from that one, cats went flying off of the bed in every direction, there even might have been a growl and a hiss or two. (Poor babies.)
       In another dream I was reading the proof sheets for a collection of plays, some of which I had written. I really wish I could remember more of that one. I would like to know what sort of play my feverish brain thinks I have written. (Other than the three one acts.)