Last night I had two dreams and they were unrelated. The first one disturbed me so much that I half-woke up to make it stop, but my imagination carried on from there for a few minutes before I managed to shut it down and get back to sleep, at which time I began to dream something else.

First, I dreamed that my family and I were at a museum that was in a huge house. There were a bunch of other people there, but all I really saw were a lot of children of all ages (but none older than, say, 12) who were running all over the place. At some point in time while the grown-ups were deep in conversation with the lady who owned the house, a group of we younger people decided we needed to use the restroom, so we began climbing all these different flights of stairs, dusty ramps, and wooden peg ladders from story to story to reach the top of the house where the bathrooms were.

At each new level it got dustier and darker and stranger. Finally we reached one level that was like an attic.* It was all insulation on the floor with brown crinkled leaves that had been blown in scattered on top, with only a few floor boards nailed down that we could walk on. As we walked across one we suddenly saw something slither under the leaves and David, my brother, moved the leaves aside to reveal a large and very toothy snake.  It had rattle-like shapes on its tail, but they didn’t rattle, and it wasn’t a rattlesnake. There was a thick strip about a third of the way down its back (starting at its head) that was about 2.5-3 inches wide that had a pattern like dried Indian corn.** The rest of the snake was a sort of dusky black colour with some scales that were lighter grey.

Anyhow, David decided to play with it, Crocodile-hunter fashion, and tried grabbing its tail. It whipped around and bit him on the wrist, displaying some pretty impressively long and spotlessly white fangs. David kept at it, however, no matter how many times it bit him (it was obviously venomous, by the way), and the crowning moment was when he decided to sit on its head to smother it/render it unable to bite him. This was, of course, very foolish, because as he crouched down the snake just opened up its mouth EXTRA wide and bit him on the butt just as he was sitting down. By this point he’d had about enough and, finally listening to my cries, abandoned the snake to come the rest of the way upstairs with us.

We reached the final story which was carpeted with a sort of dusty/faded pink carpet (sort of antique-y looking) and the kids took turns in one of the bathrooms (both bathrooms had HUGE doors. Wood painted white, about 2.5 inches thick and really heavy. I think they were about 4 feet wide and 6.5 feet tall). Anyways, there was one other bathroom and David went in there and was in there for a while. When he finally emerged (I was pretty worried by then), he was very white, had his white t-shirt rolled up, and all of his chest was torn up with deep scratches made by the snake’s teeth and these scratches were turning a nasty shade of purple and swelling up. Now I must interject here that there wasn’t a question of “is there an antivenin?” it was “how soon can he get treatment?” We also figured out that the snake was one called a “blackadder” (one word). 

Anyways, David walked a few steps forward and then sort of left himself down very slowly and bent his forehead to the ground. I was really scared by this time and helping him up, had him lean on me, and we started down the stairs, with a couple of the older kids with us running ahead to go get my Dad. During the journey down the stairs I woke up and my waking imagination went into flights of fancy that I won’t put down, since I don’t think they count.

After that I finally got back to sleep and dreamed that there was a faction in society that lived apart in a forest in huge buildings of wood with rope and wood bridges between buildings (they were mostly all very tall), and this group was led by a very tall man who looked like a cross between Priscilla’s father and one of the youngish-looking blond professors at GCC (I can’t remember his name at this point in time), and his name was “Dean”.  He was an arbitrary kind of man, and I have no idea what he was up to (it wasn’t religious or anything and he didn’t seem to care about ruling the world at all). He just ruled his little kingdom of the woods and periodically groups of interns would show up hoping for a place under him.

I already had a secured place (in the kitchens/housekeeping staff, of all things), and watched the ebb and flow of interns with some interest because I was one of the people who already earned “Dean’s” trust and we were allowed to hear all his meetings and everything. Anyways, there was one guy on a new group of interns that we got who looked exactly like that dude in the Master and Commander*** movie who carves a perfect depiction of the hull of the Acheron for Capt. Aubrey and I never actually talked to him, but somehow we got to know each other… or something. At any rate, he failed one of “Dean’s” tests, though I think there was some foul play in work (not from “Dean”, from other interns), and this dude (I forget his name) was chucked in a pretty cozy-looking room until he was to be executed, and in a room elsewhere there were a few other interns who’d also been set up.

Somehow I knew he’d probably get free, but before he got hauled off we ended up hugging and he said something to me about meeting me somewhere else sometime or other once he got free/earned his freedom with “Dean” (since that was also possible if he proved he’d been set up).

I don’t remember anything else specific, and it makes me sad. He was such a nice man. The dream ended well, though. Dean was such an interesting character. Not really a tyrant, but definitely sort of scary.

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