07.19.2001 - 9:22 a.m.

I just realized that title's a movie. I don't remember if I liked it or not. Oh well.

So this morning between my "hey you" alarm and my "get up or be late" alarm I had a dream.

It started out with visiting this huge house, more like a mansion, really, the kind where you walk in and stare at the cieling and the marble stircases and the crystal chandeliers and the gold plating in the elevator. The elevator was kind of interesting because it didn't always have a shaft, it just floated wherever you were going. It did seem to have a set route it floated on, but other than that it wasn't attached to anything. My friend and I (I'd give him a name, but it was one of those dreams where he was someone, but really someone else...) were taking a tour, I think, but then I realized my hand was bleeding so we left the group to find a bathroom. The only bathroom we could find was gross, like concert bathrooms, but empty at least. And then we couldn't get the elevator to go anywhere so we were lost.

We wandered around until we were tired, so we decided to sleep in the elevator.

I woke up a little later, when I felt the floor move.

The elevator was in a shaft now, and picking up speed.

"Why is it going down?" I asked, trying not to be too freaked.

"I have no idea." From the expression on his face, my friend felt the same way.

So then the dream skipped, you know? And we were servants in that same house. We were separated but I had seen him every once in a while so I knew what had happened to him.

The master of the house was this shriveled old guy in a special chair like a floating sponge. I think he was really fragile, and it supported him, or something. All the servants were afraid of him, because he was picky, and he'd have people killed for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Or at least, people kept dying (not always servants) and we all thought it was him. He spent his time hosting dinner parties and driving in his new car (picture a black lambourghini on hoverdrive with fully automated everything).

So one day I was walking around the back of the house, by one of the garages, and I saw someone sneaking around in what looked like a welder's mask. I hurried on, minding my business, but I knew he had seen me so I grabbed a bag of something heavy hid behind a corner of the next garage, to see if he was following. He was. I hit him over the head, but it didn't bother him too much. He was wearing a bodysuit, like samari armour, and I suddenly realized this was the master, and the suit, besides protecting him from swinging heavy stuff, was the reason he could move around without breaking himself.

So we fought. I punched him, kicked him, threw stuff at him, pulled things down on top of him. He shook everything off like the arch-villian in a comic book. It was worthy of a Jackie Chan movie.

I was losing, but then I saw his car. I beat him to it, and ran him over. Which shouldn't have made a difference, since it was a hover car, but then I figured out that the hover field must be interfering with his suit. I got out to finish him off, and he was so stubborn about dying that I had to break him into little tiny pieces before he was dead. It wasn't gory or anything. He broke like plastic, or like treated glass.

So I was free. But I was also on the end of my adrenaline and beginning to realize that people would be coming after me, and that the dead body next to me was not a good thing for them to find. I also thought about my friend, and tried to think how I could find him and save him too, but I couldn't think of anything that wouldn't get me caught. I think I decided to dispose of the body first, and maybe I could pretend ignorance. I put it in the car and climbed in after it.

And then the alarm said "Good morning. The time is..." except that's not my alarm, that's someone else's, but I swear that's what it said.

All that in ten minutes of sleep.

-stonebridge

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