The Sand-Man

Dream
May 10 2013
There are parts of this drean that are jumbled but there's quite a bit of cohesion still.

I dreamed I went with two friends to Mcdonalds in the middle of the night, supposedly after classes. We were walking in a utopia-like city with futuristic elements, with silvery streamlined lights and aerated gardens next to the roads. Between the bluish moonlight we also saw things lit up by the white streetlights and the pea green tealish colour of the floating mini gardens, and we were surprised no hovercrafts and rail vehicles were out at that time of night.

The two friends with me were Sijia and Emily and when we walked in to the McD, which was furnished in salmon and brown colours typical of the franchise in Canada, there were masses of people sitting inside. We couldn't find any seats so we turned left into a small area closed off by a glass door overlooking the children's playplace. We had troubles opening the door and found it was locked on the outside but openable on the inside, a new measure to protect the children from predators so that only someone inside could open the door. A woman playing with her kids in the ball pit opened the door for us and we went in. There was an empty table right there with four seats so we sat down, and I read the label on the wall which said "This room cannot exceed 9000kg."

So Sijia and Emily decided to go order and asked me to stay in the room to open the door for them when they got the food. I asked Sijia to pay for me and I'd pay her back in a second. I sat cross-legged on the floor for some reason and grinned up at my friends, saying something funny that I can't remember now. The two of them ran off laughing at my jokes and Emily had to round back with her usual sweet, curious expression to ask me what I wanted to eat, so I said big mac.

At this point more people came into the McDonalds and it was getting really crowded. I turned around and found an Indian family consisting of a skinny, slightly balding, moustached father and a long soft-haired, kind-eyed mother with a small bindi between her brows sitting with an adorable little girl in her lap. They appeared beside the seats where me and the girls left our backpacks. The father looked concerned that we were there because apparently they were here in the room first and he made a bit of a fuss until a worker--a teen boy with pimples and orange hair--came in to tell us that it was fine with our numbers. The father was distressed because he was worried all of us would exceed 9000kg like the sign said and that made me feel self conscious. I huddled near the wall and tried not to feel fat.

At this point the dream changed a little. The Indian family fled the restaurant with the others because apparently a curse was coming. I could hear the people through the walls murmuring "A curse, a curse..." and I watched through the glass enclosure as they all filtered out. The Mcdonalds was rapidly decaying into a moldy colour and the people fled it in fear, but I realized I had comrades to wait for. So I stuck my twin knives (suddenly I had some) into the ground and waited patiently.

My two male comrades came back and I tensely told them we were running out of time. At this point I think they were swapped with Sijia and Emily. One of them was a human hero, a young man with shining blue eyes and brown hair and dressed fit for an rpg, broadsword and red cape and all. The other held my attention. He was a tall, muscular man with deep brows and a severe expression. He looked like he was dressed like a pharaoh with the cobra-like headdress and white loincloth, and his eyes were just white with no brows or lashes. He was a gorgeous man, with something that drew me to him. He was a bit emotionless looking, serious and a bit like a fierce animal. Also, he was made completely out of golden sand.

The sandman and I were the hero's retainers. I didn't yet know how I looked like in this phase of the dream but my legs, from where I could see, were a shimmering dark violet-blue with the texture like sleek, taut whaleskin under a white gauzy wrap I wore. We made a fire out of the remains of what looked like an ancient civilization's belongings (me and Sijia and Emily's backpacks, now reduced to fossils) and we grimly wondered how we would defeat the curse on the pyramid that has been causing mischief since a thousand years ago (so I assume I am now a thousand years in the future).

I was sitting near the sandman and I shuddered. The hero looked to me, concerned, while the sandman's stoicism melted instantly to worry. He gripped me by the shoulders so that I would not fall over and then he frantically checked my hands. My fingers on the right hand, which used to be so long, were dissolving. I was also turning into sand, but unlike him, I was not retaining shape. He held me in his smooth-yet-gritty arms and I was too tired to reassure him that I was fine.

Here in the dream, I saw a flashback. It turns out the sandman used to be an archaeologist's son in the era where me and Sijia and Emily existed. I saw him as a fine young man, hair flowing in the wind and excitedly helping his father's team search for an entrance into the Egyptian pyramid that they were excavating. His father was a bit of a reckless, energetic connoisseur relentlessly pursuing a legend of how the pyramid had magic to turn everything to gold. So he and his son were excavating the front of the pyramid temple (which looked more like a roman temple facade attached to the pyramid) and that's when his father accidentally broke a gem that released the giant curse. It actually was a curse that turned everyone to golden sand, and the father was obliterated immediately. The son--the sandman--instantly turned to sand but he was in the right spot to absorb the powerful wave of magic. He stumbled out, his entire body now sand but with his consciousness, only to find that all of his father's group were screaming in pain as their bodies turned bluish violet and crumbled away in seconds. Anything organic was also turning that bruise-like colour and crumbling away, and the sandman couldn't even cry for them anymore.

Back to the present, I managed to sit back up with the hero's help as well. The hero was unaffected by the curse like certain other humans, but I wasn't so lucky. Because it's been a thousand years since the curse activated, now the effects were slowing down. My whole body was now that glittering, indigo stone colour because it was preparing to turn to sand, but the curse was eating at me slowly, as did a lot of other people who were coming to the same stage of the curse as I was. I had strong warrior's prowess so I've been helping the hero because we both wanted to find a way to stop the curse, no matter how watered down it was diluting. The hero was much younger than me--here in the dream I was almost thirty, and he was half my age--and I treasured him like a son. The hero had been asked for help by the sandman, who has been seeking people with ambitions like ours. And after we met, I became the sandman's lover.

The hero rested for the night and the sandman, an old and tortured soul bearing the guilt of all the dead people from his father's foolishness, rested with me in his arms a bit away from the hero. The sandman was exhausted. He was using his magic to keep me together and slow the curse as much as possible, but he simply couldn't give me the immortality that he had. I climbed on top of him and pressed my warm lips to his, like kissing a warm beach , and he wrapped his arms around me. He was gentle with me and I laughed, massaging the perpetual stony furrow in his brow and trying not to feel scared that my fingers were now shorter. I reassured him that it would be fine, that I would fix all of this with him, that he didn't have to be lonely forever anymore. His tongue was like a soft ribbon of water, flowing and clinging to my body. Having him inside me was filling and exhilirating, for he was hard like stone, and the sand of his body were so fine and packed that it felt like hot satin. He looked like a scary templar at first but Gods, he was so gentle, so firm with me, and when we woke in the morning, he stayed close for several minutes with that furrow in his brow before we went to awaken the sleepy hero.

Our only way to stop the curse forever was to destroy the pyramid. However, the curse was retaliating. So the electronics and mechanics around us were coming to life and attacking us. We were steps away from the pyramid now so its power was strong and the hero drew his broadsword and started slashing, and he yelled at us to go destroy the pyramid because I was lithe and powerful while the sandman knew where to hit.

A sandstorm brewed while the sandman and I leapted through the air. I slashed at the debris being thrown at us while the sandman blasted with his violet blue magic. We were like dancers through the storm and I prayed for both their safeties while the pyramid screeched at us. When we finally reached the temple facade I slammed my knives into the violet blue gem at the top and was blown back, but the sandman caught me, and we went right back into it. He whipped the sand into the gem and I stabbed it with my knife, realizing that one of my arms had wholly crumbled away in this mess with a twinge of fear. I was going to crumble soon.

I suddenly realized what I needed to do. I screamed at the sandman and that caught him off guard, and that's when I kicked him in the chest so hard, with both feet, that he careened out into the storm. I used the momentum and launched myself into the temple face, and with a satisfying crack, the gem was rended to pieces from my knife. All of a sudden, the sandstorm around us stopped and the temple face started crumbling away. I sighed in relief and let myself fall, knowing that now humans born in the future would never fear this curse again, and also knowing the hero was safe. As for the sandman, I kicked him away so that he wouldn't get caught in the destruction of the temple and resolved to die myself, but out of the corner of my eye, I saw him fly towards me between the debris and sand.

Before I could send him away again, he glared into me, and I realized his true eyes were back and they were yellow-gray. I was stunned by his magnificence in that moment, and I could not describe the squeeze of pride and sadness that overtook me when I found him racing closer. His headdress was gone and he was almost naked, but that didn't surprise me, and his golden body wove while also leaking sand in all places--he was dying, too. He used the last bit of his magic to throw a stun spell into me, and I screamed at him not to, but then my body was frozen. I wanted to save him but he wouldn't let me, and he knew that both of us would crumble regardless. My consciousness separated and I watched myself fall, paralyzed by his magic, with him behind me wading closer through the air. My whole body was the colour of bruises and my eyes were a clear blue, with soft black hair waving under an Egyptian lady's cowl. One of my arms was gone and the other was laid over my breast. The sand man, now also crumbling at a quicker rate, gently wrapped his arms around my shoulders and held me as we plummeted together.

We were shot into the sand below and then everything fell quiet. The hero fending off the machines watched as they died back to being scraps of metal and he panted, sweat coating his brow. For a moment my spirit went and inhabited one of the machines just to protect him, but I knew I needed to be with the sandman now. Once I knew the hero was safe I didn't want to worry the sandman or leave him alone any longer, so my consciousness slipped back under the sand, and wove into thr tapestry of the world's consciousness. He raced to the edge of the precipice where he was standing and looked for us over the edge, but all that was left was the pyramid and sand. He cried for us but smiled, too, knowing that's what we wanted, and that we succeeded.

After that I was a consciousness floating in the stream of sand. The dream becomes incoherent here. There was singing from the bones of the archaeology team (one of them sang "Colleen is a queen, a rose of the eve") and the sandman's soul gently took me aside and asked me a riddle. He showed me a conch shell and inside was written "Love 2, Originality 3, Tree 5." And some other things, but now I'm unsure. I saw the sandman's father in the trench made by the fallen stones and I was happy.

That was the end of that dream. There was a bit more but I can't recall now. It's been a while since I had such a vivid one, and I hope some more visit me.

Raven and the Wings

Dream march 27 2013



(written shortly after I woke up and forgotten until now, I'm sorry)



Flying with RAVEN and NOVEMBER.

In this dream I was went to this beautiful academy in the country, and I took the yellow shuttle school bus out to town. We passed by a grassy field in the afternoon, with blue skies and dandelions--everything looked vintage-filtered and nostalgic.


I got to this supermarket where lots of interesting things happened. Walked by a fish stall and watched blood and ink burst from a crablike squid (squid with crabby texture but still soft) and the woman behind the counter (who introduced herself as Nina Durjic, a brunette with a strong nose and deep set eyes) apologized and said I was the calmer of the few to watch that happen. EDIT march 29: She looks a lot like the life drawing model in Drawing 1 for our final assignment, though this dream happened before I did the assignment... Scary! A prophetic dream? Anyways, I told her it was fine and I wanted to buy shrimp.


We talked for a lot longer and she walked with me to go to the cashier where it morphed quickly back into the entrance way of the school, like the giant overpass in twilight princess out of castle town before Kakariko gorge. The lighting was now bluer and whiter and more true to colour. However, inside the big gate were a pair of MASSIVE, medium brown, wooden medieval double doors that were arched in shape. Nina complained about how I suddenly flew over head and raced her, but after she grinned, I flew higher than the doorknob. It was kind of mean of me but I slipped in when she heaved open the door a little and I quickly flew to the top of this gigantic cathedral (that felt quite small since I climbed it in wing beats). I left Nina behind yelling that it was unfair, and when I looked down, the view of the top of the cathedral was 2D and like I was playing Legend of Mana ( even though I hadn't played that game before, that was what I associated it with immediately). The cathedral had two spires and a square facade with one rose window, all in gray--I think it might be one of the cathedrals I studied in art history but I can't confirm that yet. Though the front and textures were realistic enough, when I looked down it was pixelly and looked like a throne room with green floors and blue carpet, and an empty throne chair the same colour and texture as the cathedral. Nina's womanly voiced raised higher and higher til it was like a young girl's and she called for me to fly up with her since she wanted to play too. When I landed on the strange pixelly, open roof with the throne it was like seeing the scene warped to perspective--it was eerily flat and smooth with the only real object being the throne, which was the same colour as the warm gray cathedral stone. I dropped off some groceries and flew on the other side, and then I rounded back to the front. The flight was very fun, and the wings on my back actually FELT like they were moving! It was like I had them forever and I was used to the feeling of them flapping. So when I rounded around these other students in dark navy uniforms (the original colour for Saint) kind of rolled their eyes at me with smiles since I was showing off.


It turned out to be Raven waiting for me--Nina had morphed. Raven looked so realistic and felt like different textures in this dream and it makes my heart content. He asked me to give him a piggyback flight and I reluctantly agreed. November was leaning against the stone front gate with a soft smile on his face and watched as Raven tackled my back, wrangling his lithe and small arms around my neck. He was thin and dancer-like and rather weighty. My wings felt weak against our combined heaviness. The wings were dark and dusty in colour, a cool blackish gray near the top and fanning out to warm light gray at the bottom. We failed a few times and I complained that I couldn't fly like this. But Raven giggled and insisted and hugged me tight so I complied, shifting him properly on my back between my wings and I tried to take off. Couldn't. Raven toppled over my shoulder and headfirst onto the stone, crumbling into a pile of silver hair. November freaked out but tried to keep the concerned students at bay while I resuscitated him. I slid my hands into his silky thick and heavy white-silver hair, like soft strands of silk between my fingers, and raised him by the base of his skull. Then he flopped lightly against my shoulder. He smelled kind of nice but he felt unusually heavy. I ignored the prying students as my fingers glowed cyan blue with magic and I worked out the blood flow on the giant bruise on his head. He woke up and blinked his giant pale blue gray eyes at me, each white eyelash in startling definition. He looked like he walked straight out of my digital paintings, all soft tones and shiny skin. But Raven smiled sweetly at me with all the crinkles of his eyes and I told him, annoyed, "I told you I couldn't. Use your own wings."


So Raven's beautiful soft black wings came out of his back and he said "Fine, fine, sorry." He flew with a burst to the cathedral top and November chuckled, following him with white speckled wings like a snowy owl's (my mind probably conjured this image because November has eyes like one). Mine turned orange and brown like a chicken's but I flew fine. I actually liked my new wings better with colour.


Once we were up, we dove down and out the gate and it was... exhilarating. We zoomed back to the supermarket where I slowed down and gave up on doing flips so as to not crash into the walls of products. The supermarket was very typical and atypical of an Asian supermarket at once; it had plenty of daylight and was warmly lit orange like my living room at 125 Winston castle. I zipped around a corner (sth else happened between this scene and that scene but I don't recall. The supermarket's layout is pretty clear in my head so I'll sketch it later. It was shaped like a B, with the entrance at the bottom serif and the fish in the top serif and the next scene happened in that bridging area in the letter B) Angel was there in a cute top talking to Jacky on this short flight of stairs and asking if he knew this brand of snacks were good. I smiled and narrowly slipped by her and she showed me the snack quickly. With her cute hushed voice she asked me"Want some? Do you like this one?" I thought she was chatting to Jacky because she had a crush on him but it turns out she was asking for his opinion on what to get me as a snack gift. I didn't get to talk to Jacky because he walked off but I wanted to catch him before he left again. I walked to this produce-like section and pondered over what to buy my friends. I grabbed a terry chocolate orange for Jacky and moved on. Then when I got to real fruits, me and this unfamiliar older boy who looked like Veina's south asian Cass friend were inspecting what looked like iced quartered pineapple. While the guy sniffed it I saw the label overhead--Penus. LOL. Even the guy and the shop npcs laughed. Pee-nuhsss. Haha! The way they said it in the dream was priceless.


I was rounding near the fish section again and I thought bext time I'd bring Nina some wildflowers for the display. The crabsquid was still there bursting blood and ink again but it still didn't bother me. I thought of taking armfuls of wild flowers on the highway to give to Nina and then I woke up.






Well, the most important part of this dream was seeing Raven in such high definition. It felt nice to have him flutter his lashes at me.