Dream 05 → What Do You Mean It's (Not) Symbolic?

[irregular]

Dream Effects: A slight feeling of disconnection. Confusion, lots of it, and the dawning awareness that you're having a (rather weird) dream.
Warnings: Rampant symbolism. Forgive me.


It's a bright, hot day and your arms are bare, but you can't seem to make yourself feel it.

Presume there's a field stretching away in every direction, wide and boundaryless and entirely empty; presume the grass is long and wild and tumbled by the breeze, and brushes against your sides as you walk. There's a hill - well, more of an incline, 'hill' seems a bit ambitious for what this is doing - and a small white building at the crest of it, a Greek temple of some sort with pillars and a triangular roof. Presume (and there's nothing else to see and nowhere else for you to go; you really might as well) that it's vitally important you get there.

Not that there seems to be any reason for it. When you get there the door's ajar and the building, too, feels quite empty.

But you're here now, and you figure you might as well go inside. You push open the heavy wooden door just wide enough to let yourself in, walk down a shallow flight of stairs. The door swings silently shut behind you and melts back into the wall.

Somehow, this simply feels logical.

(It's a dream. You're dreaming. It's kind of how stuff like this works--)

Presume you're standing in a long, narrow white room, at the bottom of the stairs. Black and white tiled floor, patterned like a chessboard; white-painted walls with high, white-framed sash windows on either side; the sunlight streaming in from both sides, casting pools of light across the tiles. The windows are closed, and yet the thin white drapes that frame them are billowing in a breeze you can't seem to make yourself feel. It's quiet here, and elegant, and utterly empty; you can't help feeling uncomfortable. It's a little bit like being in church, and you feel like you should lower your voice. You wonder if you're breathing too loud. You wonder where the Hell everyone's gone.

At the far end of the room, two heavy wooden doors and a large bowl of white flowers on a stupid, spindly little occasional table. Behind the doors-- something. People.

Pick one. Just try it.

Two doors, two rooms - you're hesitating.

You know (and you don't know how you do; you just know it's how things work, in dreams) you can only go through one. You should only want to go through one and yet the other one looks fine too, and... well, how on earth are you supposed to choose, when you can't see how there's even anything to choose between?

There's a person behind you, tall and dressed in some kind of vestments; there are arms about your neck. You know you must be dreaming, because you never heard them coming. Because you're not trying to fight--

"You see," they say quietly, "you can't decide, after all."


[Ken wakes up with the lingering feeling that he's missed something; he's not entirely surprised to realize that the stupid Dreamberry didn't miss a thing. Well, he probably was overdue for it. Could have been worse, he guesses. At least this time it wasn't stupidly embarrassi--

[Wait. What the Hell date is that supposed to be?]

... damn, how long was I asleep?

Comments

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

... yeah, I've had teachers like that.

You normally remember your dreams? Cause before I got this thing [Ken taps the Dreamberry with one finger] I coulda been dreaming about anything. I don't remember 'em at all, normally... maybe they've always been this weird and I just never noticed.

[alphaophiuchi]

I remembered some of them. Not nearly so many as I do here, and a few of them have been far more bizarre than I ever expected.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

Well, having this thing do it for you does kinda help where remembering this stuff goes. If they didn't show everybody with it, I figure they'd be kind of neat.

[alphaophiuchi]

It's true. As far as Muggle technologies that invade your privacy go.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

[Okay, you lost me.

[... hang on, doesn't this thing translate? Yeah, I think mine's on the fritz. Ken taps the Dreamberry, frowning at it.]

As far as what?

[WHAT DOES THIS WORD MEAN I DO NOT KNOW.]

[alphaophiuchi]

Muggle technologies that - I'm not repeating the entire thing.

[wait.] A Muggle is a non-magical being.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

[You said it again WHAT IS THAT WORD--]

Is that what it means? I thought the translator was on the blink again.

I didn't know there was an English word for that. Damn, I shoulda paid more attention in class...

[alphaophiuchi]

That's the word we use - I can't say for anyone else outside wizarding culture.

[1/3]

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

So it's not a common one then?

[That's... kind of a relief. At least it's not his complete inability to speak English's fault. This time--]

[2/3]

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

[--wait.]

[3/3]

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

... Have you always been a wizard and I just... missed it?

[alphaophiuchi]

[sure, he doesn't make an effort to broadcast it, really, but...really?]

Erm. Yes?

Except when I was your boss. I was just a bloke then.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

[Really.]

Wow.

[Ken's next question, while stupid, is only entirely logical. It's just unfortunately clueless-sounding:]

How does that work?

[alphaophiuchi]

I wave a magic stick and magic happens. [smirkysmirk.]

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

[Frowning at you, Draco.]

I'm not a kid, we don't have to start that basic. we just don't get people can do that where I come from-- [Okay, I didn't think we got telepaths and then Schuldig happened] Well, I ain't met any if we do. I mean, were you born doing it or what?

[alphaophiuchi]

[he shrugs.] Some people need the basics; I've learned to take my chances.

Yes. Magic's run in my blood for centuries, as long as my family's been around. On either side.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

So it's not like something you can learn, it's either there or it ain't?

[alphaophiuchi]

Precisely. And trust me, you would know. If not when you were small, by the time you were ten.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

So it's kinda like being one of the X-Men... Are lots of people wizards where you come from?

[alphaophiuchi]

...X-Men?

[MOVING ON. By the by, that's a silly question. It gets a silly answer.] Yes. The entire wizarding world. The rest are Muggles, like you.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

[... yeah, Ken's just gonna keep thinking you're a magical X-Man, Draco. It makes sense. To him, anyway.]

And how'd you get to be a wizard, then? I mean, I know you gotta be born one, but how's that happen? Like winning the lottery, or is it like having brown eyes 'cause your dad did?

[alphaophiuchi]

[better than Tamaki. Tamaki thinks he's a secret agent. This is what happens when you tell someone about the Dark Mark but not in detail.]

Like having brown eyes. Or in my case, grey eyes. My parents were wizards, and their parents before them, and theirs before them. There hasn't been a Squib in the family tree for generations, last I checked.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

A squib?

[You use words funny, mister.]

So how'd it all start, then? I mean, you're a wizard because your parents are, and their parents were and so forth-- so where'd it start? Aren't you gonna run out of parents after a bit?

[alphaophiuchi]

Something with magical blood who can't use magic.

[he shrugs.] I presume Muggles came after wizards, and once their blood was dilute enough, they just stopped being able to use magic.

[insorrow.livejournal.com]

Wow, that must suck. [Sounds like being tone-deaf in a family of musicians only nine million times worse.]

You mean back where you came from everyone was a wizard way back when?