Another World

Before last night, I hadn't had this one in a long time. I'd almost forgotten about it.

Growing up, I used to dream all the time that parts of my house were actually portals to another world. I would just walk through the wall like it was an illusion, and I'd be somewhere else. Sometimes, these were just good dreams about going somewhere nice. Other times, the other world was an escape from something that was chasing me.

There was one particular spot that was always the same.  I had it again last night, and even though I haven't lived in that house for years, that was still the setting. Everything was as it had been when I was in school.

I am running from a monster that wants to hurt me. I can't see it, but I can hear it thumping and bumping through the house. I outsmart it by running down the hallway, and trying to circle back around to the living room so that I can go out the front door. Unfortunately, the path is blocked, and I cannot get out that way. I turn and go back down the hall, through the foyer, and up the stairs. The monster is falling behind. It can't find me, and it's still downstairs. I can hear it going the wrong way, getting further from where I stand. If I just stay still, it won't know where I am, but it's going to run out of places to look in the downstairs eventually, and then it will come up here anyway. I might as well make a run for it while I have a head start.

I can hear the monster banging around at the furthest part of the house from the stairs. It's right under the room where I'll be going when I run. I have a plan. Carefully, I set myself as if to start a race, and then bolt down the hallway to my parents room. As I near the door, I hear a crash and a series of thumping noises from downstairs as the monster tears through the house toward the stairway.

In my parents room, I jump over the bed and open the window. I quickly turn the lock to hold it open, so that the monster will think I went that way. Then, I run to the closet, enter, and shut the door. The door has a little push-button lock, which I engage. Then, I turn toward the back..

I walk through the wall.

Turning back, I see a screen-and-glass storm door, with a little hook-latch to secure it shut. I engage the latch. 

Then, I turn away from that door. I am in kind of a tunnel. In front of me, about three running steps away,  is a cheap, thin wooden door, the type you would put on a closet.

I push the door open and go through, turn, and lock it. It has a little twisty button in the middle of the knob.

I turn away from that door, and face the next one. It's another wooden door, but heavier and sturdier. It looks like it would be tough to break this one. Even the hinges are thicker and heavier. I push it open, and go through. On the other side, it has a deadbolt lock and one of those chains that attaches to the wall. I engage both, then turn and face the next door.

I can hear the monster in the bedroom. It's really noisy, pounding on the furniture and stomping around. It roars loudly. I hear it smash the window and the window frame. It steps out onto the roof of the family room, where I hear it thudding around. There, it will discover that there are only two ways down, climbing on the UHF antenna tower that someone put in years ago, or jump. The monster weighs too much to climb that. I don't, but I don't know if it's smart enough to figure that out. It may come back into the room. My heart is beating so loud, I'm sure it must be able to hear it.

I keep going, facing the next door. This one is metal. I think it's aluminum, but it's thick enough that I can feel some serious weight to it when I push on it. I go through, close the door, and turn around. This door has a push-button lock, a deadbolt, a chain, and a metal bar that swings down to block it. I engage them all. It goes well, until I move the bar. That makes a noise, and the monster is instantly quiet. I can't hear anything.

I am terrified. It knows where I am. I can only pray that it doesn't realize it can go through the back of the closet. There is no use trying to be quiet now. In a split second, all hell will break loose on the other side of those doors.

I bolt to the next door. It's much heavier than the last one, and sounds like it's made of steel. Even if I had not made a noise with the bar, the sound of the metal grating against the floor would have gotten the monster's attention. I slam it shut with a loud, echoing thump, turn the deadbolt, engage the extra large, heavy chain, draw the bar, and pull handle that is beside me on the floor. A slim steel panel in the ceiling opens, and a three inch thick, iron portcullis the height and width of the door falls to the floor, inches from my nose. I can't see the top of it. At that, the monster roars loudly enough that I can hear it through even the door I just closed.

I hear the first door crash open, then the second. As the monster begins pounding on the third, I turn away and run. There is a good twenty yard hallway in front of me. There is no discernible source of light, but I can see another door in the distance. I run.

I hear the monster crash through the third door. It slams into fourth with a resounding gong sound. That is not going to hold for very long. As I cross the short distance to the hallway, I can hear that the fourth door is beginning to warp under the pounding it is taking.

I don't go through this door. Here, there is a trap. On the other side is a weapon that will fire hot oil at whoever opens it.

I find a crack in the wall, stick my fingers in it, and pull open the front of one stone. There are two small levers. When I push the first one down, the base drops out from under the last fifteen feet of floor I just crossed. The floor is still there, but anything weighing more than a cat will fall through upon trying to cross. I push the second lever down.

A section of the wall opens. I close the stone. It looks just like the rest of the wall. If you didn't know what to look for, you would never find it.

I go through the opening. On the other side, there is another stone I can open. Inside, I push down another lever, and that closes the wall. It looks as if it had been undisturbed the whole time.

I hear the fourth door give way. The monster roars, almost a scream. The sound sends shards of ice up through my back.. I could begin to cry. Instead, I quietly pray that my tricks will slow it down.

I run down another long hallway toward yet another door. This one is smooth, and it's standing open. There is light on the other side. I hear the monster slam into the steel door with a thunderous crash. I only get one chance to do this. I can hear the door breaking free of the wall, and I can only hope that the portcullis buys me some time, but I have no such luck.. The sound of the portcullis giving way seems distant through the wall. Right after, I hear the surprised yelp of the monster as it falls through the floor, followed by grunts and groans as it hauls itself out of the hole.

I slip through the opening. The vault door is two feet thick, steel-reinforced stone, and is built into an equally strong steel door frame that runs along the wall for a couple of feet on either side. It is incredibly heavy, but the hinges are well oiled, and it's made to assist in closing it. It will be harder to open than it is to close.

Once it is closed, I face a huge wheel in the middle. Turning it counter-clockwise, I activate several rows of two inch thick metal bars which extend out of the middle of the door's thickness, and into the frame on either side, into the ceiling, and deep into the floor. I can hear the monster's angry bellow as it bashes open the last door, and is hit full on by the oil. I hope that in its flailing, it will fall back down into the hole, but instead, I hear it pounding on the walls. Soon, it discovers the secret door, and begins to bash its way through.

I have two final touches. The first, I activate right away. Pulling a lever mounted in the wall, I drop another iron portcullis across the door, and I hear an identical one fall on the other side. I wait. Beside the lever is a handle attached to a chain that hangs from the sloping ceiling. I take hold if that, but do not pull until I hear the monster's footsteps approaching the door. As soon as I hear the metal straining as the monster pulls on it, I give the chain a good hard yank, and sparks jump across the door as thousands of volts are fed through it. On the other side, the monster screams a terrible, thunderous shriek that would put the Bean Sidhe to shame. There are huge clangs and crashing noises as it thrashes around trying to break itself loose from the hold of that current.

I turn from the door and run again, this time into a great hall. There, waiting for me, is a band of knights in armor. They give me a welcoming look, as if I am returning to my home instead of fleeing it.

Each of them is armed with at least three weapons, and they tell me to suit up and arm myself, but to stay back.. Behind them, on the walls, are various medieval weapons.

I'm strong, but not incredibly so. I know I'm not going to be able to handle any of the bigger, heavier weapons enough to do any good. The bow is equally useless, because without having practiced with it, I have no way to predict my aim. I choose a shorter sword. It's still pretty heavy. Between the handle and the blade, it's as long as my arm. Next to that is a suit of armor, but I'm afraid if I put that on, I won't be able to move. Instead, I grab a silvery chain shirt. It's too long, the body reaching my knees, and the sleeves falling down over my hands. I wrap a belt around my waist, sliding a sheath for the sword into place.

On a table, there is what looks like a chain ski mask.. I put that on, as well. It feels weirdly cold against my skin, and I expect it to pull my hair, but I can feel that there is fabric underneath that part of it.

This is as ready as I am going to get. I stand behind my guardians, and listen to the creature bash its way through the door to our world.

The metal doesn't just give way. It explodes into the room, chunks of debris preceding the biggest, most bizarre looking thing I've seen on two legs. He stands twice as tall as the biggest knight in the room. I can feel my stomach drop to my knees, and I momentarily have to fight the urge to heave.

Atop his massive head is a scraggly mess of sporadic strands of hair jutting out in all directions from various points of origin. His upper face, nose included, looks like a Neanderthal man, but below that is more of a huge dog's mouth, including the teeth. His huge, glaring eyes are red, with tiny black irises and black veins that stand out. He has tusks like a warthog. His upper body has the shape of a gorilla, with a massive, hairy chest - much more hair that is on his head. In fact, the further down his body I look, the hairier he gets. His broad shoulders lead to long, muscular arms that end with huge, fuzzy, clawed hands. Below the waist, his legs are bent like those of a four-legged animal. His long, thin feet look catlike, with long, sharp claws sliding in and out under huge tufts of hair on his toes as he moves. A scaly tail snaps back and forth behind him. At the tip is another cat-claw-like appendage that I have a sneaking suspicion would inject poison if it hits anyone.

He leans forward in an aggressive stance, and his jaw unhinges, dropping nearly to his chest, as he shows all of his teeth and lets out a massive roar. He pulls his second pair of arms out from behind his back.. Each of those two hands holds a huge club. Next to his massive size, they look like bowling pins.

The monster rushes forward, and so do the knights, bellowing war-cries of their own. As much as I was afraid for myself moments ago, I now am desperately worried about them. How can they survive fighting such a terrible beast? Yet the first to reach him lands a resounding blow to the gut with a huge morning star, and the creature loses its breath and its momentum.

The second knight uses his shield to shove the monster back further, and then stabs at him with a sword not much longer than the one I chose. The monster swings one of his empty hands, and knocks both knights halfway across the room. They flounder, trying to get back on their feet in their heavy, ungainly armor. I flinch, watching the impact. This is terrible!

The whipping tail comes around and nearly hits another knight, who cannot get out of the way. The biggest knight saves him, slamming his claymore into the claw and knocking it back at the monster. With a howl of pain, the monster grabs at the sword, and swings a massive club at the knight. The knight slices off all of the fingers on the monster's one hand, and he lets out a high, angry shriek..

The battle continues, knights and monster exchanging blows, but it soon becomes clear that we need more knights. The monster is able to stand up to terrible damage, and though the knights are armored well, their armor is slowing them down. I am sobbing with fear and anger as he batters my friends. Soon, he will take one of them down who will not get back up. They are showing signs of fatigue and pain.

The only thing I can do is join the battle, and I'm not very confident that the addition of my hand is going to make much difference. The smallest of my knights is head, shoulders, and chest taller than me. All I have is a glorified dagger, and barely a hint of armor.

Then, there is a break in the action. The monster pounds his way through the line and charges at me. I brace myself, ready to slash at him with the short sword, but I know that there is no way this little toy is going to stop anything that big.

The knights attack from the side, and the monster twists and turns, shoving and throwing them aside with his hands. One knight manages to disarm the hand on his side that is holding a club. On the other side, three knights grab one arm. The monster stretches toward me with his free hands, and wraps that tail around one of the knights. They let go of his arm to help their comrade, and he lunges toward me. I am so startled that I drop the sword.

Thinking quickly, I grab two of the fingers on the hand closest to me and pull as hard as I can, leaning back and hauling his weight around to my left. The monster stumbles, staggers, and falls forward past me as I let go. I have to jump away to the side to avoid getting hit by his flailing legs and that tail, which has whipped its way loose from the knight. I grab the sword and bring it down as hard as I can, not on the monster's back, but on the back of its ankle, slicing through the tendon. The muscle above it immediately snaps up, and the monster screams. Before it can react more than to draw into almost a face-down fetal position, I slice the other ankle, too, and then slash the sword across both of its exposed butt-cheeks. Dark, thick blood oozes from the wounds. It looks like half set up black cherry gelatin.

The knights thrash forward pounce on the creature, bashing and stabbing, before it can get to its knees. That tail comes down into the crowd, but one gauntleted hand grabs it and with a jerk, breaks it off. Then, it's all over, and the pommel of that claymore is sticking out of the back of the beast.

At that moment more knights arrive, bursting in through two big wooden doors at the other end of the room. With them is a lady about my age, who is a little taller than me. She's kind of muscular for a woman, but not so much that she looks like a man. She runs over to me and grabs me by the arms. She looks me over like a mom checking out a kid who just missed getting hit by a car. Her face looks worried.

Her hair is really long, hanging down around her like a golden shawl. She is wearing something that looks like a simplistic but elegant prom dress, and she has jewelry all over. She seems both relieved and disappointed. She proclaims thanks to multiple deities that we are all uninjured, though with the knights that statement is slightly questionable. At least no one was hit by the poison tail, but the men are definitely beaten up.

When I look at her, I realize that I have to go back through that passageway. The longer I am here, the more this place feels like the place where I belong, but if I stay, there will be many more monsters, and many more battles, and they will get hurt. She does not want me to go, but she does not want me to stay, either.

I pull the mask off and lay it on that little table. The woman lays one hand on my cheek and opens her mouth to say something.

This morning, I woke before she could get the words out. I've had this dream periodically from shortly before my teen years. Back then, the lady was just a girl. She didn't have quite as much jewelry, and her hair was shorter.
The last thing she always does is ask me if I am going to stay this time. I can't remember ever having the dream without that happening, except when I am awakened before she speaks to me.

Often, the dream goes past that point. I tell her that I have to go back, until I learn what it is that draws "them" to me. Until I can solve that problem, I am a danger to everyone here. It isn't always the same monster as the one I dreamed of last night, but it is always something horrible and scary.

My friend always insists that I at least have some time, and she is right. I can stay there for a few hours without incident, especially since we've just defeated one. Another won't come along for days.

If I don't wake up before we are done talking, a dinner is laid out, and though the knights are banged up and bruised, we all sit down at this long table and eat. There is an amazing amount and variety of foods at this meal, every thing I've ever eaten and enjoyed. Needless to say, if I get to the dinner, I totally pig out. If I do not wake up before then, I always wake up at some point during that feast, but I can't feel too badly about it. I know they expect me to disappear.

It seems odd to me that in these dreams, I always run to this place, at first to escape, then to receive help, yet at the end, I always have to leave to avoid further endangering everyone there. It seems to me that I've ended up there that way many times, yet it doesn't make sense to me that I would go there when I'm being chased if I'm worried about the safety of those people. Once or twice, there's been some hint or inkling that there is a reason, something to do with having control over where the monster goes and who encounters it... but I've never come to any definitive conclusion, and I still run there whenever I have that dream.