7/30/2022
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The dragon and the voice
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THE DARK CLOUD IN MY DREAM IS A TRUE NIGHTMARE
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The last time I dreamt of this dark cloud, I was in the big living room of my family home. The one we mostly never use unless we have company over. The truth is, I hate dreaming at times. I hate watching myself. I’m always running away from these beings. Or trying to save someone. But one thing I know for sure that I’m afraid to see is that damn dark cloud that cast the sky into darkness. I sat and watched my sister talking about trivial things about death. I tried to move, but I was glued to the seat, all I can do was watch as she was slowly going upstairs, allowing the dark shadow to come out of the clouds and engulf her whole.
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This dream was a transition from another dream, that same night, as I slept.
In the first dream, I was in a rush. I was in my home getting my siblings when they were a few years younger and my grandmother from my mom's side out and into the family truck. As I placed the kids outside, they ran and that was the last I heard of them. While my grandmother wasn’t willing to get out of bed, she just wanted to stay there. I wasn’t planning on leaving her behind.
When I have my grandmother in my dreams, I tend to be glued to her until I know she’s safe. Being stubborn, I tossed her to my shoulder, determined to bring her along. “It’s too late.” She explained. The thing I was running from in all of my dreams all these years, has finally caught up to me. The dark clouds.
I closed my eyes and when I opened them I wasn’t near my family home. “Didn’t it engulf me?” Confused, I looked around the area. It seemed as if I was placed in a tiny, deserted two 1-story building motels that held two 8-foot length pools, placed in front of our rooms. We rested above a hill. The building we were using was all rooms, while the other building was considered supply storage as well as the restrooms and changing rooms.
Between the building was a dirt path that was headed to what seemed to be a village, it was the back entrance of the motel.
Every one of my family members was having fun in the pool and everything seemed normal. I went to check in the room I was staying in and noticed my grandmother cradling a baby in her arms. She didn’t seem as if she wanted to leave the room, so I left her be. While she didn’t look at me, she was at least walking around. I was a little relieved.
I was headed back out when I noticed the once sunny sky was quickly turning dark, with the wind picking up speed and the dirt with it. “Something wasn’t right.” I think to myself, the atmosphere wasn’t the same as before.
The second I picked my guard up, that’s when I heard screaming coming from the pool farther from my room. I ran, following the scream, but the loggia between the pool and rooms only grew in size. I might have well been running a marathon by the time I reach the end.
Huffing to catch my breath, I look up and noticed they were fending off a dragon. I had dreams about monsters and demons, and golden gods the size of the Statue of Liberty, that have been trapped inside a cave. A dragon was brand new to me.
The BBQ pit they were using before was now being thrown to the dragon, to scare it off, as well as lounge chairs. I began shouting to distract the dragon, giving my family enough time to run away.
It seemed as if it wasn’t there for them, but for me. Its body hovered above the pool, while the lower half rested on the roof of the building. The sky grew violent, there was a storm coming soon. Lighting kept flashing, yet the sound of thunder wasn’t heard.
I kept my sight on the dragon as it did the same. Its eyes were the same height as me alone, its pupil was round and kind. I wasn’t sure whether it was friend or foe. Its snout wrinkled as a dog when threatened or a cat when upset. Either way, I wasn’t willing to find out.
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I backed up carefully, all while keeping its attention glued to me. With one flash of lightning struck down near the tree in the corner of the motel, the dragon disappeared.
A scream was heard from the other unused building. My cousins were hiding over there. Everyone from earlier all ran, trying to save the kids, from whatever they screamed.
I was still stunned by what I have just witnessed. I was the last one to run to the other building, but when I was passing the dirt road entrance, I seemed to have noticed a little girl clutching a stuffed animal. Standing between the buildings.
At that moment, the sky began to pour heavily, I was getting soaked. The little girl seemed more interested in the pool than the rain. The girl's mother stood at the front of the entrance, not wanting to enter the property.
I shooed the girl back to her mother. That’s when I looked up and noticed the sky. It was the dark clouds. It was engulfing everything in its path, and the village was next.
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For some reason, I woke up inside my dream. I was fully aware, that I was still physically asleep. Now I had full control of my dream body.
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I called the mother and child, who were hesitant to go back to the village. That’s when something in the sky or in my head whispered, “they are going to die if you don’t help.” It repeated the same words again. I didn’t know who this voice was referring to.
Rushing the mother and child to my room, I checked on my grandmother, who was unaware of what happen outside. They began talking to one another. “It’s not them,” I told myself while running to check on the other group.
The majority of my members were neatly placed on the floor, draped in a tarp. I had a feeling that the voice didn’t mean their death. Walking past the bodies, I went to aid the last two that trapped themselves with the thing that killed the others.
I wasn’t aware up till now that my sister has been missing from the moment the dragon showed up. Making use of the heavy rain and thunder, I found a way to lure the monster out of the building.
This monster was a shape-shifter. It kept transforming into a goat, a cat, a white rabbit, and a snake. I wasn’t sure if this demon was the dragon from earlier, it never clarified to be the dragon, by turning into one.
Unfortunately, I ended up slipping onto the dead bodies, making my dream loop back to the beginning, where I opened my eyes. The dream played out the same. Before the dragon, before the girl, and before the dark storm.
I was cautious, now knowing what to do, but I ended up repeating my mistake, by what I assumed, at first, seemed like I stepped on the dead bodies. My dead members actually grabbed my ankles.
This time, I woke up in the front yard of my grandmother's home. Everyone that was dead was now walking and arguing with one another, over a dead tree, that’s been uprooted.
Something didn't seem right once again. I had never had a dream within a dream. I was mentally awake in my dream realm. Glancing at everyone, I noticed all of my family members from my mother's side.
“I would never dream of them all together at once,” I recalled the voice from the other dream. “Someone was going to die if I don’t help.” I looked at the sky once again. It was completely dark. The grey clouds shadowed the light of the sun. “Where’s my sister”, I yelled.
I woke up, unsure how the dream ended, or if I found my sister.
That morning, I told my mother of my dream, leaving out the detail about my sister missing, and she was shocked to hear it. The truth was, she had a somewhat similar dream that same night.
Two unknown individuals were walking away while my family was having a party in a public pool. Every one of my family members was chasing and shooting the two men, who had something to do with what was happening to my sister.
My mother was doing chest compressions while demanding to bring the others back alive. She told me that she questioned me in her dream, while I was meant to be babysitting my sister, but all she told me that I said was I couldn’t find my sister in the water.
My sister was coming to and passing out. In what seemed like an eternity to her, cousins brought back one of the men, whose leg was drenched in his blood. She wasn’t sure if it was shock or her rage that woke her up, but she sprang out of bed that morning to check on my sister.
She was awake and heavily coughing. She began laughing at the idea that her cough was loud enough to wake only or mother from across the hall.
My sister never heard about our dream, but when I asked about hers, she recalls being near a pool sitting down and eating snacks as she watched her friends playing in the water. She doesn’t remember jumping in, just her choking on the snacks, causing her to wake up, with sweat drenching her body.
That voice was talking about my sister this whole time.
SINCERELY,
STRAWBERRY