Nick was a normal desk employee. Today, he is still a desk employee, but he heavily doubts he can still call himself normal. And that doubt began a week ago, when he started to have dreams that were beyond anything he could ever imagine.
For some reason, even though his workload was nothing out of the ordinary on that day, he began to feel very tired as soon as he got back home. He tried to fight it for a while, but it was futile. So instead of forcing himself, he laid on his bed and closed his eyes.
He didn't remember opening his eyes, but he had them open, and before his eyes was a strange scenery. He was in the middle of some mountains. He looked around, but couldn't recognize the place at all. Very quickly, he remembered that, no that long ago, he was in his bed. So by deductive logic, he came to the natural conclusion : "I'm dreaming !".
But that didn't feel right. When did dreaming start to feel so much like real life ? He could walk, talk, even feel the wind going by his face, but he was certain all of this was a dream. He tried every way of waking up, and eventually was down to his last idea : jumping off the mountain. Even though he was convinced nothing could happen to his body in real life, he couldn't bring himself to do it. What if ?
He had nothing else to do, but he felt like waiting wouldn't do anything good to help that situation. And so, he tried to go on an adventure in the moutains. Quite soon after departing, he started hearing noises. But not random noises. Voices. And unlike in his regular dreams, the voices were completely clear. They came from humans, no doubt about it. When the mysterious entities were close enough for him to see them, he half expected to see familiar faces, or weird creatures, or anything else that wasn't real. Because, you know, he was in a dream. But instead, the opposite happened. In front of him were five people, three men and two women, who all looked perfectly human and normal. And sure enough, Nick had never seen them before.
"Hey, we found him !" said one of the women, who was apparently leading the group.
All of them raised up the pace, and ran to Nick, who just stood there trying to process this whole situation. He tried to ask the question he wanted to answer the most :
"Where am-"
"Okay, just listen, we don't have time." interrupted one of the men. "We are all asleep right now and we have to defeat a monster to wake up, you got it ?"
Nick didn't get it.
"What ?"
"Urgh, we have to do the long version again… So, basically, you are dreaming right now and you were sent to this world along with us, and in order to be free we have to accomplish a mission every night. You're still with me there ?"
"So… this is real ?"
"Well, yes and no. We're in some kind of dream world so you could say that dreams aren't real but… you're not, like, imagining it. It's really happening, and you won't be able to wake up in real life if you don't do the mission."
Before Nick even have time to ask more questions, one of the women shouted to the group :
"Come on, let's move now ! We don't have time !"
And so, the group turned back towards where they were coming from, and starting walking quite fast. Because he still had a whole lot to ask, Nick walked close to the man who was answering him, in order to talk a bit more on the way there.
"So, we have to… like, slay some kind of monster ?"
"Yeah, but this time it's really easy. They are complete pacificists and they live nearby. We'll just stab it or something."
"Oh. I expected that you guys had to slay some demons, or dinosaurs, or…"
"Well, sometimes it's more complicated, yeah. But now the real problem is time."
"Time ?"
"Yeah. 5 minutes in this world is about one hour in real life. That's why we can't stay here forever."
"What, so… how long has it been since I fell asleep again ?"
"We all fall asleep around the same time, and we've been here for about half an hour, so… "
"Half an hour… Six hours in real life ?"
"About that much, yeah. I hope you didn't plan on waking up early, ha ha !"
Nick started thinking about himself in real life, quite panicked, considering six hours was usually the amount of sleep he had every night. But come to think of it, he fell asleep quite early, so he had about 3 hours of leverage.
"Fifteen minutes… I have to be awake in fifteen minutes maximum."
"It's good, then. We're almost there."
After a couple minutes, even quicker than he expected, the group stopped around a field where the grass was quite tall. The woman leading made a sign so that everyone would stop walking and be silent. Nick looked around to see what all the fuss was about, and then he saw it. The 'monster' that the group was about to hunt. It looked like some sort of mix between a pig and a sheep. On one hand, it looked quite gross, but on the other hand, it also looked like an animal that could actually exist in the real world.
The leading woman raised her hand. "It means she's going to kill it herself" whispered the man to Nick. He looked at the woman, trying to understand what she was about to do, until suddenly, a gun appeared in her right hand. She pointed it at the pig-sheep monstrosity and shot what seemed like a dozen bullets in a row. Sure enough, that was sufficient to kill the beast, who fell down in a pool of blood.
After a few seconds, Nick fell a strange sensation. But strangely, he felt like he had that sensation not long ago, just like an intense will to go to sleep…
"Wait, are we… going back to the real world now ?" he asked.
"Yeah, don't worry, it's normal… So, see you tomorrow !"
"Um, before then… what happens if you die in this world ?"
"Oh, well… you'll never wake up in real life."
Before he could even share his concerns regarding that answer, Nick's dream ended.
The first thing Nick did when he regained control of his body, was bolting out of his bed and checking his room from every angle. It was just the way he left it, like nothing ever happened. Well, in the real world, nothing ever actually happened. He tried to forget about all that happened during the night, constantly telling himself that this was just another dream that he thought was real at the moment, just like the others… but even he didn't believe it, for the simple reason that he remembered everything that just happened. Waking up in the mountains. Having a real discussion with real people. Hunting down an animal. He even remember the loud gun sound that still made his ears hurt a bit, even in the real world.
The next day, Nick was almost impatient to see if this phenomenon would occur again. When he got home from work, he just laid on his bed and waited. But unlike last time, he couldn't fall asleep immediately. A couple hours passed, and suddenly he felt the intense sensation of sleepiness again. This time, he recognized the cue, and laid on his bed in order to 'properly' pass out.
Unlike last time, he didn't appear alone in the mountains. He was in some sort of field near a lake, and the whole group he saw the previous night was also there. The man he was talking to the previous day recognized him and waved. Normally, Nick would freak out, but he already adapted to that crazy situation. So he smiled, and waved back.
After a whole week of crazy adventures, Nick managed to notice one thing. Not only he didn't feel any basic need in the dream world like hunger or bladder-related issues, but mostly, when he woke up in the real world, no matter how long the mission was, he was always perfectly rested, like never before in his life. And for the first time in years, Nick was always going to work feeling happy. While working, he was so energetic that he did a lot more than usual, and this got him some good points among the higher-ups. So he thought, maybe what he thought was a curse, was actually a blessing ?
That night, after the 'jump', Nick saw everyone in the group once again, but they were much more tense. The leading woman, who he learned was named Claire, was unusually nervous, and also shouting at the other members of the group, who were already walking without taking time to do even a quick mission briefing.
Eventually, Nick asked his friend in the dream world, Karl, about what was going on.
"It's Claire's daughter. She's the newcomer this week, but for now she's lost, like you were when we found you." Karl answered.
"What, really ? So we're going to look for her ?"
"Well, we could, but we only know she's in a far area, and the location is usually very inaccurate…"
"But, you found me last time, right ?"
"Oh, hum… That was mostly luck, actually. We weren't looking for you, but Claire insisted on looking around before going to the target, and she found you in those mountains."
Nick never took the time to realize that all that time, he was kept alive only thanks to Claire. At that moment, he really wanted to thank her. But it was a bit late now, and judging by the current situation, it wasn't a really good idea to mention right now.
"All right, but… how do we know that we're going to find her daughter in time ?" Nick continued.
"We don't. We aren't even heading there right now."
"What ? But where are we going then ? Slaying the target ?"
"No. She wants to bring her daughter into our group with the alternate way."
"The alternative way ? There is another way of getting the people to join the group ?"
"Yes, we all know it but… we've never used it before."
"Why not, if it doesn't require you to look for the person ?"
"Because… in order to do this, we have to sacrifice a member of our group."
This is a two-part story. Click here to see part two.
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