Dream Log Beta: Trials

Rumpelstiltskin was my new teacher. More specifically, Mister Gold from Once Upon A Time was the new teacher. Of course no one knew who he really was, not even me. However, something about him rubbed me the wrong way. Every opportunity I got, I tried to catch him in some evil act. He soon noticed my suspicions. Instead of attempting to dissuade me, he seemed to egg me on. He called me to his desk and told me to leave my backpack with him. When I returned to retrieve it, he had filled it with other student's assignments. I called the principle in and told her what had happened and that I thought he was trying to frame me, but she and "Mister Gold" just laughed it off.

"I'm trusting you to help me make corrections," Rumpelstiltskin explained, "you are a star student after all, aren't you?"

I could have punched him for that. Later, he found my multi-tool and modified it somehow so that it spun around itself on some sort of geared system. I had to admit, it was mechanically beautiful. It also made the tool completely useless except as a weapon thanks to a rather large knife he had attached to it. I found that just a tiny bit strange...

It made more sense when people started killing each other. Students living in dorms divided themselves along class lines, freshmen against freshmen, sophomores against sophomores. The last ones living got some special honor, though no one bothered to explain it to me. All I knew was that that knife came in handy when some boy hyped up on testosterone attacked me with a sharpened pull-up bar. (Side Note: Why do so many of my dreams seem to turn into The Hunger Games? I've never even seen it or read the books!)

I got away and spent most of my time hiding in my room rather than face death or turn into a murderer. Things went a bit fuzzy at that point. I believe several decades past. The world had gone through another ice age or something because snow was everywhere. The boy that the dream now followed wore a parka reminiscent of the southern water tribe from Avatar: The Last Airbender. The boy also hesitated to kill others his age. He and a more vicious girl ended up being the last two alive of their age group. They had done well enough that a council of elders met to try the pair one more time. The winner would become next in line as chief.

When the boy and girl entered the council room, they saw at least six people kneeling around a low table. One particularly ancient woman with pure white hair that she left down caught the boy's attention. He suspected that she had the real power in the room. The other elders were just for show really. His guess proved correct.

"How is your German?" the woman crooned to the girl.

"Wunderbar," replied the young lady. The two proceeded to converse in German, yet with strange accents and vocabulary that the boy had never heard before.

"Junge, findest du nicht, dass ihre Augen wirklich wunderschsoen in diesem Licht scheinen?" the elder asked him. Mercifully, he understood that she had asked him if he also found the girl's eyes lovely in this light. The question caught him a bit off guard. He glanced towards the girl, whose eyes really did stun him. Why was this relevant?

"Ja, Sie haben recht, aber was, wenn sie im anderen Licht wäre?" he answered as properly as he could. Yes, you're right, but what about when she's in different light? 

The old woman nodded approval. She then indicated to another elder to open a door. When he did so, an older youth stumbled through the doorway and collapsed. Frostbite and injuries marked his body. Without a word of explanation, the old woman rose and stepped through the doorway, followed by the other elders, leaving the two youths with the injured man.

"It's got to be some sort of test," the girl reasoned.

"Whatever it is, we have to help him," the boy asserted. 

He rushed over to try and see to the young man's wounds, but he panicked and struggled. Then, the girl clasped his hand in hers and smiled at him. He fixed his eyes on hers and relaxed.

"You must be very brave to have taken such wounds," she crooned as the boy pealed away blood soaked furs and started to wrap the wounds with strips from his own clothes, "What level are you?"

"I'm...I'm a senior, Marion level. That's not so bad, is it?" It seemed that Marion level was like being a brown stripe in karate.

"Wow, that's fantastic," the girl praised, giving his hand a squeeze.

I wanted to find out what happened. I wanted to know whether the girl or the boy would win. Heck, I wanted to know if I had died thirty years ago or not. Unfortunately, the jerk of a fusion reactor called the sun woke me up.