sanity is relative

I was sitting in a dream-randomized apartment that was supposed to be mine, on a couch (that I don't actually own) with my computer in front of me on an Ikea desk-table (that I do actually own). I was playing Torchlight while talking to my friend on the phone. I had her on speakerphone and the phone was sitting next to me on the couch, and she was busy doing something else that wasn't a video game (can't remember what).

We were talking about MMOs specifically, and I said, "You know what I'd really like to see? An MMO that doesn't come out with an expansion every ten seconds. Doesn't Call Of Cthulhu only have like, one still?" And then I thought about it a little harder and said, "Was there some reason why we couldn't play Call of Cthulhu?" My crappy memory was vaguely hinting that either it hadn't liked her computer or mine, or there was some distinct issue that had made us stop playing pretty much right off, like mechanics or general aesthetics (Neverwinter, I'm looking at you).

She said, "No, no reason I can think of. We should try that sometime." Ah, so we hadn't even played it yet! I was starting to get excited.

Then the dream shifted into something that I think was supposed to be the trailer to the Call of Cthulhu MMO (which does not exist, for anyone wondering and reading this... but man if it was done right, I'd want to play that sooo hard). A man and his maybe pre-teen daughter were going to New England on vacation, but for some reason the small house they showed up at was very definitely of Japanese architecture. It was daytime, and I only remember trees in the distance behind the house.

The idea was that if the characters put on special red-colored glasses with thick black frames that looked extremely dorky, they could see things related to the area being haunted. I remember a shot out of a high window that showed the edge of the porch roof above, and the heads of several people all hung off the same rope by the neck, in the corner of the roof.

Now the game had something much more like a single-player feel, ala Silent Hill meets Fatal Frame. And it was becoming reality, and I was the father character. I was thinking we should get used to wearing the red glasses, even if we might see shocking things, because clearly there was a mystery going on here and it would be a shame to miss any clues. I was inside, looking at a simple, low table with various objects on it, while my daughter was wandering outside nearby.

We both ended up looking onto this weird little side-porch thing at the same time, me from inside via a window right by the porch, and her from out on the grass (the side porch did not meet the front porch, it almost looked like an empty wood pallet set right next to the house but I think it was supposed to be legit construction). On that little porch a girl was lying, in what I would call cutesy anime winter-wear. I remember specifically that the fairly-short skirt was pink and had a band of white fluffy trim around the bottom hem. She was just sprawled lying there, no blood or anything, but I had the distinct impression she was dead.

I heard my daughter gasp, and I felt fear creep into my heart as I lifted the lower-left edge of my glasses just enough to realize it wasn't a vision of the past. I said, "She's real! Come inside, quickly!" and my daughter rushed inside. I had crouched down because I was too afraid of the scene outside, and said something about calling the police. Suddenly I heard movement outside, like someone scuffling around a bit on that porch thing.

I got up and looked out the window again, and the body was gone. I yelled something like, "Bring her back, we're going to find you!"

I heard a very quiet, gruff male voice hiss, "We'd love to see you."

I think I kept yelling stuff for a moment, but there wasn't anyone visible outside still. It now seemed like whatever had been there had gone away, and now my daughter and I were left with this cryptic and disturbing piece of information. I asked her if she had heard the voice. She said no.

Then I woke up.

I had been dreaming of other things, but then it was like I woke up as a new character in a new setting. I was the teenage daughter of a witch and warlock who also had a mean, bratty, spoiled son younger than me. They treated me badly. But they were all asleep at the moment, it seems like it was night time at this point but since the world was so many shades of grey, it was hard to tell. It was evening, at any rate. I was supposed to be in bed.

But what mezmerized me for a few moments was that the world was black and white. I knew then that I'd probably never dreamed like this before, that I must therefore always have dreamed in color. And I was so scared I had lost that ability entirely. But at the same time it was surreal, like being in a black and white movie, but this was real. I looked at my hand and my arm, and was amazed to see my grey skin color in this black and white world.

Then my subconscious filled in some dream plot: I knew no better, this was my world, and it had always been black and white. As I wandered towards the front door I realized I had to get out of here, that I'd had enough of my parents' opression and I was going to run away from it all forever. I ran outside and down the street, and I was wearing a flowy white nightgown. As I left the boundaries of my parent's property I must have also left the sphere of their magical influence, because the evening world was suddenly alive with color. I am not sure I have ever seen anything so brilliant, especially with the background of the dream that I'd never seen color before. The sunset above the houses to my right was a dazzling orange with a touch of incredible pink. It was a very Dorothy-waking-up-in-Oz moment.

I fell backwards, lying in the street staring up at the sky, blown away. I knew vaguely that lying in the road wasn't the safest or cleanliest idea, but I really didn't care, I was so enthralled. But then I heard the sounds of a car in the distance and got up. I ran up the incline in the yard ahead of me (beneath the sunset) and fell to the grass just in time, the car going by me didn't see me. I wasn't sure about this new world, and wasn't sure what people would think of me running around in my PJs. Then I realized it was my parents' car, with them in it (and my awful brother), and they were calling out my name and saying I needed to come back home, that it wasn't safe here, stuff like that.

I kept still until they were gone and then ran across a couple more yards, a street, and up into the next yard. All the yards seemed to have this little hill up into a more average yard area. I was part-way up the hill when I heard the car again, and fell flat on the grass again. I could see a married couple coming out of this house, just to enjoy the evening or something. I thought very hard, trying to create a spell to turn myself into a cat, and it worked, plus I created another cat as well, a real one, so I could copy its mannerisms. Plus my parents might be suspicious of one stray cat (as they were missing one stray daughter) as opposed to two. And both cats looked the same, orange and yellow striped short-haired tabbies. I don't think I was supposed to know how to use magic, that they'd forbidden it to me, but it was in my blood. Thinking about it now, I probably had massive untapped power I knew little about.

There was a tree in the yard and the couple was standing by it now. I went straight up to them and acted very friendly and meowed, looking for sympathy. We're just a couple of stray cat's looking for love. *meow* Adopt us!<3 My parents pulled up in the car and asked these people if they'd seen a girl wandering around lost. They also expressed suspicion about the cats, asking where they'd come from because they did look like newly arrived strays. Meanwhile I did kitty things like lick my paw and rub up against the tree. The couple said they knew nothing and the cats were just cats (possibly even claimed them as their own, because I got the impression the couple thought my parents a bit rude) and my parents left.

I turned back into a human and told them who I was and that I needed their help. (I think the other cat was unsummoned as well.) They led me inside the house to their living room and sat me down on the couch, sitting on either side of me, the man was on the right. I told them I was opressed and mistreated at home and the lady said something like, "Oh, I'm sure your parents are just trying to do what's best for you and they're worried sick about you, we should make sure you get back to them as soon as possible." She was rising as if to go call them but the husband said, "Now wait a minute, maybe the girl is right, we should let her speak." It was like the woman had a general faith in humanity being good, and the guy was more of a skeptic.

I knew then the easiest way to prove my plight (right then, like I'd forgotten it or it was so commonplace for me). I told them to look at my back, and it's like the bodice of my nightgown was fitted and had a zipper running down the back of it. The lady pulled the zipper down and they saw that my back had cuts in it, some long and some short. Some of the cuts looked very fresh (but clean, not bloody) and there was evidence of scars from many wounds past. Now both people were horrified at my treatment, and I knew I was safe with them and they would help me leave my old life behind.

Then I woke up.