A dream


Today, I had a strange dream. I’ll tell it below, but in a way that it is unified and makes sense.


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My background


I should have never gone to the beach that day. I’m just a kid; I shouldn’t have to know all this. Why did it save me of all people? I’ll get to that. First, my name isn’t important. I figure I’m just like every other boy around: curious, excited, too trusting at times, you know.


I grew up with a family scattered throughout the southern United States. This was fun for me, since I could travel, but I could only see most of my cousins once a year or so. It was on one of these travels that this particular story begins.


The beach


I stood with lots of strangers as we looked over the rolling dunes of sand. This part was really boring, but it’s what I’ve always done when we first get to the beach. Why people looked so long and hard, I didn’t know at the time. Everything was pretty quiet for a large crowd, and I could hear the tide.


I asked someone what we were looking for. He turned to me, thinking I knew more than I did.


“Legends say that at a particular time, the beach is flooded with something that looks like green algae. But it’s so much more than algae.”


I shivered at that. But in a part of my mind that I didn’t want to admit was larger, I was excited. I wanted to see this thing.


A sea of green


I was getting bored, and tired, and not just a little cranky. We stood on this beach until the older people started complaining, and then they finally brought out the chairs. That was nice, but when you’re sleepy, the only thing that’ll do is an actual bed.


So as everyone dozed off under the setting sun, it wasn’t hard to miss the green tent that had begun to appear in the water. It seemed more to pull itself out of the sea than be slept in, although that seemed to help it. I noticed this, through the haze of sleep. But I decided to check it out myself. What better way to prove myself to these interesting people that seemed to be chasing legends, to chase a legend myself.


I got up, and softly padded over to the highest dune overlooking the sea. The green stuff had gotten out of the water, and was now moving out the sloping dunes, directly towards me. It wasn’t scary, more interesting and exciting.


I wondered what these creatures were. I wondered what they could do. I wondered, in a selfish part of my mind that I could never take to Sunday school, what they could do for me.


A meeting of minds


I sat and waited. I wondered why the others hadn’t come to look for me, but old people snored, that’s just what they did. I didn’t mind. I was more than happy to be the one to learn about these creatures. Finally, as the night wore on and mosquitoes came and went, one was finally close enough to reach me.


I eagerly extended my arm as far as I could to touch the slick, slimy surface of the creature. I now, thinking back, wonder why I would do such a thing. I’ll have to ask around, if I can't even bear to show my face to them anymore.


As I said, the surface was slick and slimy, and warm, like a living body. My hand sank down into the creature a little. I reflexively tried to draw it back, but there was some resistance to that, so I left it. The feeling was starting to grow on me. It was starting to feel good and inviting.


I smiled. I closed my eyes. And then, as cliche as it sounds, I heard a voice. There weren't as many creatures as I thought, but one giant one, large enough to fill the horizon. I looked left, and all I saw was bits of green, coming together into whatever it was supposed to look like. I looked right, and the same was happening. The creature was gathering itself.


“You’re a young one,” it told me. It didn’t talk out loud, but I knew what it said in my mind. It gave the feeling of curiosity, just like I had for it. I was amazed, but not really shocked. I’d read the books, well some of them. I’d watched enough TV to know what this is something that people think about.


“Who are you?” I asked. I spoke out loud, but quietly, just in case it couldn’t read my thoughts.


“Who?” it asked, shifting itself as more pieces joined it. “I was not given a name among y’all. No one but you has seen me before.”


I think that, if I had been just a little sharper, just a little smarter, then I would have noticed that it used the word “Y’all,” showing that it knows plenty about the place it’s in. Or at least, knew plenty about me. Looking back, it must be using the person’s mind to translate its intent. But how could I know that as a small boy who hadn’t seen anything like this before?


“Oh, so I’m the first?” I said, excitement rising.


“Yes, you are. I am very excited to learn about you.”


“Sure! What do you want to know?” I asked.


“Ah, I just want to know how I can help you? Bonds are forged in this way, with experiences of life.”


My smile widened into a grin. This creature was different, but also smart. I could learn from them, and they could help me, maybe in school or something. I never wanted to show it, but making good grades would be nice for a change.


“Yeah, let’s do it!” I was about to stand, but the creature pulled me back down. The pull was slightly stronger than I expected. I shook my head. It just shows how strong the creature was, I suppose. My grin widened at the thought of that. I would be strong, and smart, almost like a superhero.


“Wait,” it told me. “I can’t just be dragged around by you; then people would notice.”


My grin fell away slightly, and I cocked my head in thought. “How can you hide yourself then? Can you change color?”


“I have a better idea,” they said. “Do you trust me?”


“Yes,” I said. “I trust you.”


“Very good.”


The warm, comforting feel of their body began to move up my arm. I looked down at my hand, and could only see my hand. And yet, the feeling of comfort, of warmth, of safety continued to fill my body.


“Do you want to be big and strong?” it asked me, now feeling as though the voice were almost my own.


A picture of a mighty warrior appeared in my mind. The name Goliath struck me, with a feeling of honor and pride.


“Or,” it said, “would you rather be large and luxurious?”


A picture of a boy or girl, I couldn’t feel which, appeared in my mind, covering the horizon just as the creature did, but was soft, smooth skin and flesh, moving across the sand in slow steps. A feeling of having no care in the world, of just enjoying existence, filled my mind.


I like both options. The warrior was cool, and the one that felt most like a house cat was nice and easy. But I decided that neither would suit me.


“I just want to be me, for now, if that’s okay.” I don’t know why I felt like I should ask their permission, but it felt like something I should do.


“That’s alright,” it said. I almost couldn’t tell the difference between my thoughts and their thoughts. But that didn’t bother me.


“The sun is about to rise. Let’s go back to where the others are,” it said to me, and we began walking back to where the others sat, dozing in chairs.



“Let’s keep looking. I think if we stop looking, it’ll appear just after we leave. You’ve seen the movies, right?”


They were thinking of leaving. We shouldn’t let them do that quite yet. We wish we had chosen a big, strong man as our face, but no need to change things now and spook the other ones. We used our voice to try and talk them into staying. We had other tools, but wouldn’t use them unless we had to.


“Ah kid, I like your spirit, but it’s the next day. The legend says they only appear at that specific time.”


“What if the legends are wrong? We… I think maybe we could spend a day looking anyway. Look in the water too maybe.”


We had left some of us to watch the waters, and the passage back, and it wouldn’t hurt to have a few more of us. We would have to devote more resources to bending the minds of the older ones though.


“The legends have never steered us wrong so far, boy. How is it that you’re so sure?”


We sighed inwardly, exasperated. We didn’t have time for this to turn into a full argument. Other ones would remember that. And dealing with the memory of this specific strain is difficult. Strain? We’re not plants are we?


We had to act, and try not to be seen doing it. That’s exciting! We smiled, and used a bit of Connection with the older person to calm him, pulling on his feelings, dampening them. He’d not experienced this before; none of them had. So he didn’t notice as he began to think that the boy may be right. Now, we have to make it look real.


“But sir, legends don’t have to be wrong. They could be incomplete, too.”


A light came on in the person’s eyes. We saw it before the person’s face changed. It looks like we’ve done it!


“That is true. Yeah, I guess we should look, just in case.”


He turned to the others, and gave them instructions on where to look. He did say they should look for blue algae, but no matter. Perhaps one of them would find another of our pieces, our Shards. Perhaps one of them would become one of us.


Growth


It was some time before we became all 16. Well we know it’s more of a game we play with the strain, making a pattern for them to follow, sometimes to dead-ends, sometimes to false ends. We weave 16 from books one of the more seeing people have written. We wonder if we could read those books sometime. That would be nice, maybe with that luxurious form.


One of us with an older face was inwardly caught in a blazing emotion, as another imagined them both in Luxury form. Another two of us were similarly stricken with emotion at the idea of one being in Luxury form while the other was in War form. The rest of us, still guarding the passage, noted this reaction for later study.


The knowing


We walked back to the others. We knew what we were going to do, and smiled, warmly for the others, as we greeted them. We told them how they would find the red algae, about how the creatures were interesting, but not so smart as they had been led to believe.


We thanked ourselves that we were able to hide the green tent of our skin. Everything was going so well, when the leader approached us. He seemed slightly troubled. We saw that he was approaching the youngest of us.


“Well boy, we never found it. You were wrong, and we’ve wasted an entire day looking.”


The youngest of us leaned forward, and we instinctively gathered behind them, protecting one of our own. We weren’t taking any chances. We brought our Investiture to bare, just in case. If the leader had been paying attention to anything but our youngest, he would have noticed how warm it was around him, and the slight green of the skin of those around him.


“I know where it is,” the youngest said.


“You mean you made us search all over, and you knew all this time?” The leader was suddenly angry, and we pulled at his emotions, cooling him, calming him.


“No no sir, I found it a while ago, but I thought well, since we were leaving, it wouldn’t help to tell you.”


“Okay boy,” he said, calming down but not quite as calm as we’d like. “You lead then.”


We lead the man over the dunes, down to the water. Initially, only the youngest lead the man. We didn’t want to spook him. So, the other 15 followed behind. We were close to our guards, but far enough to where the man couldn’t just swim straight to them. We then sat in the sand, and waited until all 16 had joined us. The leader looked around, panicking.


“Why are you all here?”


“We are the sixteen chosen,” we all said, our voices quiet, as to not alert the others, not of us, who still remained. We were thrilled at having a single voice again. We’d not felt that in many, many years.


“What happened here? How are you all doing that?”


The leader stood up, looking around. We clamped down on his emotions. He struggled, wanting to feel, needing to remember. We couldn’t let him alert the others.


We dragged him back to the ground, holding him, as we released his emotions.


“We are what you have looked for.”


We allowed the natural green of our skin to show to this man. He looked at us, of all ages and sizes and colors and genders, and was astonished, as he should be, as this has been our first unveiling in decades. We congratulated ourselves on one of our better unveilings.


“What are you then? The legends don’t say.”


“We have no name. We’d never been given one, and never will be. But we’ve not talked like this in decades. So, we’ll share a bit with you. It’s not like it’ll matter.”


“What do you mean it won’t matter?”


We held his body and emotions still as we spoke in quiet voices and images about ourselves. We touched his skin to more easily touch his mind. He shivered at the touch of our tentacles which wrippled out of our skin. All sixteen of us Connected with him, creating a net of thought, of Intent, of Knowing.


We are not balanced. We are extreme. This defines what we are for, but is not our name. We have never received one, neither from our faces, nor from those we serve. We do not have a very high existence.


We were once higher, of higher life than the stars, higher than anything of this existence. Then, a war came, and we became lower, even lower than the sands at the bottom of the sea. This is all metaphor of course, any strain of human can understand things like this. None are prepared for the complexities of the real story.


“That sounds like Cristian talk,” the leader said, his speech slurred from the hold on his mind.


Our story begins, though, much further back than Christianity, or even the first people on the Earth. Our story is not that of humans. Our story is of gods.


“You, you think you’re gods? Nah. I like the idea of there being only one God I have to deal with.”


We laugh. Our green skin seems to bloom like an opening flower. We will not speak of that one. He has done nothing for us or for these humans in thousands of years. We wonder if he’s dead, and all his claims of being forever were mere boasting.


The leader began to thrash around. “What did you mean when you said it wouldn’t matter that you’re telling me all this?”


We tried to clamp down harder, but the man kicked one of us somewhere painful to the face, and managed to slip out as we helped tend to ourselves.


One of us broke away from the tight huddle around our prone form, and chased the leader. We needed to bring this under control. We could no longer move slowly and carefree like the waves. We could no longer be Luxury.


The acting


They changed before my eyes. All sixteen of my crew who had been taken by these creatures grew taller, muscular, enraged. Their skin, green skin, shown like the midday sun as their clothes fell off them. I guessed that this was their war form or something. They spoke of Luxury and War as if they were more than just their normal meanings.


So, like any man used to looking for old legends and weird stuff, I ran. They chased me, of course, but all that looking for them paid off. I know the beach from top to bottom now. The only issue was that there was nowhere to hide. And they eventually caught me. We eventually found each other.


We are now complete, maybe. The seventeenth Shard has been acquired. We send the leader of us to round up the others, and bring them among us. We have never attempted this before. But, it seems like a nice thing to try. If it fails, we simply melt back to the ocean, back to the passage, back to the place of remembering. No human from any strain has found our passage yet. We doubt they will now that we’ve moved on. We held in our joy at freedom, our power, our green, as we boarded the plane back to where we will begin our search for another legend. Perhaps we’ll have more luck, now that we ourselves are legendary.


The false


So, that’s it. I have no idea if I’m still a part of us, I don’t know why I bother to write this. I guess so others can see it. Look, Luxury and War all around. Prepare. But I guess it won’t hurt for others to read this. I joined the group after all that, since I helped find the weird green things. I don’t remember much about the adventure, but well, it was the first I guess.


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Well, that was longer than I thought it would be, but yeah. Some things were changed. There was some explosion at the end, and the creature chose to send the boy far away to escape it, and the boy and the creature were the only ones talking about what it was and such. The ending of the dream was far less interesting than what I’ve created. I started writing this not too long after waking up, but decided to use that to a narrative advantage. You may see it if you look, look hard enough.




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