HOSTILE : Coredump : Dream 1

The dream had humaniform tigers in it. There was talk of lions too but I never saw them. We seemed to be in Africa in the savana but near a forest so the heat wasn't too bad. The dream also had semi-human monkeys in it. Specifically monkeys, not chimps, apes or gorillas; that was really important. Some of my friends were there and had their real-lifish jobs.

There was a huge oval metal gateway next to a clearing that was a portal to another place. As the dream progresses you find out the monkeys were from inside that place and the tigers and lions had discovered the gateway first and were hunting the monkeys thru the portal. We set up electrical fences to keep the big cats away and bring the monkeys over to our side. After a while on the other side we notice that the big cats trapped over there are looking more human, converting to a more upright pose, and acting rather peculiar. We also find out that we can't take any computers or fancy electronics over there. Basic solid state stuff seems to work but computer memory and storage is wiped. Also, we can't stay over there more than a hour or so before blinding visions and images begin to freak people out and they have to leave.

The power of the gateway is so great that plants in the vicinity are growing wildly and the pea patch garden next to an abandoned forest research station has a crop about everyday. A human research group and company has formed there and has been checking into it for months. A small, quiet insular culture has grown up and rumors about the place are starting to spread to the rest of the world. The peas have "magical" properties, it seems.

I come into the dream long after the research has started. I'm brought in as a programmer to help boot-strap some computers on the other side for automated research. Somehow, one of my friends recommends me as someone who can problem solve up a minimal system for transmitting new code to the computers after they have passed the gateway. I do that thing, with much trouble and have an encounter with the tigers. Rather than kill and eat me, and now walking on two legs, they poke at the equipment I brought and discover two telescoping rods. We play at "fencing" tho neither of us are good and then I come back through, my hour expired, dreams (yes in a dream. grr...) and visions rising, and the computers well on their way to collecting real data. (For the geeks, I know that I use old-style hardcoded modem chips with good error correction and hack a lightweight FORTH comm kit to download a full os that can then be placed on the other computers.)

At dinner that night, we are forced (by convention in that insular group) to wear ugly bright colored dinner jackets to the communal meal. Large 8-10 person booths are set up under canopy and friends intermix in small groups with others they don't often dine with. As you sit, a monkey-person waiter takes your jacket and brings it to you at the end of the meal. You then head back to your rooms alone and ditch the jacket before going out at night. (yes, this is my perception of dressing up for dinner, I suppose.) The monkey person is basically a slave and mostly ignored by everyone. Since it is my first night and my (fucking ugly florescent yellow-green) jacket doesn't fit well, he offers to let it out while I eat. Obviously I am freaked by meeting a talking, walking, almost-human monkey but I play it off cool and thank him.

A couple of friends and I sit down to dinner but they all seem rather palid and grey and conversation seems forced. The strangers at the table introduce themselves and all seem impressed that I got computers barely running on the other side. Most seem annoyed that it took so long and imply that politics was to blame.

Everyone at dinner perks up as the appetizer is brought to the table. For the eight or ten of us there are about 10-12 large tortilla chips that are sorta scoop shaped and a little bowl of peas. By their body language this is highly anticipated but is incomprehesibly weird to me. My friend warns me that you have to act speedily to get one on a chip and eat it as people will compete for the extras and even snag yours if you aren't quick. The trick is that the peas are imbued with some "magic" and will turn black and blow their charm if they touch your skin. You must place one into your mouth and chew it between the chip pieces for the full effect. My table moves slower than most as they all seem to get a kick out of my having a first go at it.

The peas turn out to act as a flavor "muliplier" and as a mild narcotic and mood enhancer. The shock of the flavor, my natural caution around drugs, and the horrible thought of multiplied corn chip and pea flavor causes me to run to the edge of the deck that the tables are on and spit the mouthful onto the ground. The party pretty much is shocked with many of them shouting for me not to do it. Where the pea and chip mash lands in the weeds, a shoot bursts forth and grows to about 15ft high almost breaking the deck where I stand. A hush falls over the group of tables and then conversation resumes, a little louder than before. Apparently I'm not the first to do that and the massively excelerated plant growth was expected.

The next day, I discover more and more of the monkeys put to work around the camp and find that they don't trust people who eat the peas. They are able to smell it on the people and know that it dulls their senses after a while. Further news from my friend teachs me that a by product of peas is the main cash crop that fuels the place and that even cut 1000 times it still holds enough potency to cure some minor ills. The pea pods that the peas come from are strangely tough and inedible but if processed without contact with humans can be mixed into a fertilizer that seems to yield better, faster crops. I also find out that the tigers and lions have attacked people before but that I seem to have been the first they sought out for contact without attacking. As the day wears on I find out that two other people, sent through to work with the growing number of electronics that have finally gotten up and working have had an encounter where they were poked with sticks and encouraged to fake duel with the tigers. One tiger was able to jump through the gateway for a minute but left after touching one of the electric fences.

At dinner, I refuse the peas and even convince one friend along with his girlfriend and her friend to do the same. I point out to them later, in a sauna (Yeah, sauna in the savannah. Fuck you, it's my dream.) that theyhave more color in their skin without it in their blood and that everyone seems too under the influence to get much done. While there with a number of other people, I am informed that I will have to go back in and solve the next issue, the computers can't seem to transmit much data back uncorrupted. Later as I leave the sauna, a monkey towel-boy encourages me to listen to the dreams closer while in there...

The next day, I wander into the gateway area all set to do my job and find that in the night a normal tiger tried to breach the fences to get to a monkey and was fried by the fences. Yucky. Once inside I find that some of the equipment has been "played" with by the tigers or lions and is broken. The rest needs to have better error correction installed so I busy myself with that. Thanks to concentrating on my job I lose track of time and the people outside are still distracted by the downed fence and dead real-tiger. After more than an hour of furious labor I find that the dreams and imagery are back and they are encouraging me to sneak around behind the gateway and sleep for a bit. I do so and the dreams for the first time aren't violent or painful. Instead they are regenerative and calming and I wake up refreshed after about an hour and find that I feel better than I have in years, younger even and my back and knees no longer hurt. Also, people are frantically trying to find me and are out in force running down to the lake and to the tree line to search for me. On this side of the gateway, the entry is out in the open up the shoreline a bit from the lake and all the trees are a ways off rather than looming over like on our side. Nevertheless, the geography is almost an exact match. The savanah has a huge depression that corresponds to the lake on the other side.

As I wake up I notice that the tigers are around in the trees, staying well away from the well-armed men searching but watching me closely. I call the men and women in and send them back through, assuring them that I am fine. They think I'm hallucinating from the images having driven me mad and try and drag me back. The tigers come running from the trees and the people, startled, scramble to the other side and prepare to turn on the shielding at the gateway. (The electric fences at this point have no physical substance even though they have had before. *shrug* Dreams is weird things, folks.) The tigers slow as they get to me and demonstrate their new prowess with their evolving hands, now able to wield the telescoping tubes almost as extensions of themselves. They seem happy and well fed on nearby game and to my suprise have become a bit omnivorous and are snacking on some of the fruits of the trees. (BTW, I got the strong impression of strawberries here but they don't grow on trees.)

While fencing (Which I think is funny in the dream since the poles are used to set up the fences) we accidentally injure each other with the sharp points. The tigers panic, as they haven't seen one of their own injured for real since they grew upright. I flounder for a moment at the severity of the wound but get the bright idea to crush some of the peas from the other side with my gloves and brush them on the wounds. The wounds almost instantly stop hurting and crust over with the blackened paste of the spent peas. Hours later I will find that only a scar remains.

In trying to leave the other world, I find that the people on the other side aren't around to kill the fence long enough for me to get through. I have found out that the portal isn't of human make but that our gateway simply stablised the opening into the other world. With a little experimenting and a visions to guide me a bit I find that by concentrating at one edge of the gateway I can make the field extend a couple of feet or so and slip through. I sneak off since it is clear once I get across that they were trapping me there intentionally.

At the third dinner (I no longer wear the jacket, as I hate it and had told the monkey fellow not to finish fixing it at the first dinner) my grabbing handfuls of peas to cure myself and the tiger is the talk of the evening. Mostly they are horrified that I wasted so many on wounds that would have healed fine without them.

As I come out of dinner the plight of the monkeys comes home to me from the dream. They are from the other side and were becoming more "human" and sentient. By rescuing them we interrupted that process and our investigation of the gateway had trapped the small groups of tigers and lions on the other side to take the benefit of that improvement. Meanwhile the poor monkeys were suffering from menial jobs rather than meeting their destiny. Also, I now find out that the higher ups in the company are well aware of the narcotic nature of the peas and use it to keep the humans in line much the way they use the fear of the tigers and lions to oppress the monkeys. I am convinced that the gateway is staying open only because of the imbalance and our meddling.

I resolve to send the monkeys back and with the help of my few non-pea-influenced friends teach a couple of the head monkeys some real fencing moves. The girl who was friends with my buddy's girl was an expert; handy that, huh? In the darkest night we sneak back to the gateway from behind and I concentrate hard enough to open the gateway. I use my body like an extension of the gateway oval, with my foot against the frame and hand wrapped around it I make a gap between my body and the frame that they can jump through from both sides. The gateway edge cuts into my clothing (As individual molecules leap one way or another?) and burns my skin a bit. From one side I can see the head tiger gaping in amazement as a hundred monkeys rush out from beside the gateway and run for the trees. One monkey stops and meets him with tube in hand and offers a play-fight.

After a quick bout, the tiger comes to me, just as the last of the monkeys slips through. He waves his sword at me in greeting and grins sharp teeth. I tell them both, "Listen to the dreams and follow the images where ever they lead you." They nod and start to go to their respective groups. At the last second I warn the tiger, "And tell the lions, too." Faintly, as the gateway collapses, I hear the tiger roar and then say "Ok. We won't forget you!"

I seriously have no idea what the fuck all that means. I do find it an amazing set of images of a "Garden of Eden" with a paradise on one side, swords and flame, magical healing and more. The implication that once fully sentient that they would take another gateway out was implied but never clearly stated. Nor was the obvious connection to the garden of eden ever made in the dream. They and I were blissfully unaware of that aspect while the dream was in force. Weird, huh?

Must be too much Planet of the Apes advertising mixed with too many furry comics. Yeah, that must be it.