Stupid Sexy Cryptids [60, 61]

60: Haunting Dreams

I wasn’t a big fan of my dreams, especially after the anti-psychotic meds twisted them into awful, nightmarish reflections of reality deprived of any sensible direction and logic.

Dreams of high school are the worst. They feature endless, liminal hallways, the urge to go somewhere, the nagging feeling that you're late and cannot find your classroom. 

This one started like all the others—gray fluorescent lights humming the song of their people above me, the smell of industrial floor cleaner and teenage desperation thick in the air. Everything was painted in shades of gray, like someone had pulled all the joy and color out of the universe and left only the sense of dread and anxiety behind.

I clutched my backpack straps tighter, moving through the maze of identical hallways. 

I was late. I wasn’t sure what exactly I was late for. Maybe a test. Maybe having my photo taken for the year book. Maybe some other stupid reason. 

My dream-addled mind didn’t provide me the wiggle room to think clearly. I simply knew, on some level, that I had to find a particular classroom for some particular dread-inducing reason which pushed me one step ahead at a time.

Room 11811 didn't exist. It never did in these dreams. But I kept looking for it anyway, because that's what you do in high school nightmares—you search for a place that doesn’t make sense and cannot possibly be found.

The lockers stretched endlessly on both sides, their combination locks watching me like dead eyes. At times, my footsteps echoed wrong, each one arriving a half-second too late, as if the sound had to travel through water to reach my ears.

Then I saw them blocking my path. 

Other students. 

Memories, vague manifestations of people who usually made fun of me, pushed my teenage self around. This time, however, two girls at the front of the crowd were suspiciously well defined.

A very tall girl stood by the lockers, jet-black hair cascading down her back like spilled ink. Even in the monochrome dreamscape, she seemed to absorb what little light existed, creating her own gravity well of social dominance. Her entourage flanked her—the usual bothersome suspects whose faces I could never quite remember upon waking.

Another girl lounged against the lockers, a vibrant, ginger mane inexplicably standing out against the rest of gray, smudged reality. Her gold eyes tracked my movements, and freckles dotted her face like constellations. She smiled, showing teeth that seemed just a bit too sharp.

The girls spelled out major trouble, a dreadful impediment to my dream-quest.

I tried to duck into the nearest classroom, to avoid the crowd, but the door was painted on. Just a flat surface pretending to be an escape. My shoes squeaked against the linoleum as I attempted to reverse course.

"Like, look who we have here, girls." The brunette declared. She flipped her hair with a malicious grin. "It's the dweeb."

The jibe hit me physically, making me trip over my own feet. Words don't have weight. Except when the bullies said them in a dream, they always did.

"Trying to sneak past us, Clifford?" She pushed off from the lockers. "That's, like, super rude. We're just trying to be friendly."

The other grayscale bullies giggled. Their faces were difficult to focus on, my mind slipped off them. This was normal. Their leader however, felt far too real. 

The ginger girl stayed silent, tilting her head as she observed me with unsettling gold eyes like a cat waiting to pounce.

"I'm just trying to get to class," I muttered.

"Class?" The brunette stepped closer, looming over me. "What class?"

“Uhhhh… the class,” I outputted. “Sorry, gotta go.”

I graduated years ago. This was a dream. I knew it was a dream. But my dream-bound mind insisted I play along, insisted I feel the familiar twist of teenage fear in my gut, the inescapable insistence that I was late. 

So very, very late.

"I..."

Her pure-white smile widened, showing way too many teeth. Were there that many teeth there before? The fluorescent light above her flickered ominously.

"You know what I do with confused little bunnies, don't you?" She reached out, her fingers longer than they should be, sharp nails painted jet black. "I help them remember their… place."

She grabbed my shirt and spun me around. The world tilted, gravity forgetting which way was down for a moment. Then she slammed me against the lockers.

The metal didn't behave like metal should. It rippled like mercury, spreading silver waves from the point of impact. The entire wall of lockers wobbled and warped, undulating.

She leaned in close, leering at me with silver-gray eyes.

"I... I need to get to class," I repeated.

“So small and adorkable.” The ginger giggled. “Hrmmmm. You’re looking pretty swank too, darling,” she admired the brunette. “Mmmmm… human legs. This calls for fitting human names!”

What? My mind wobbled sideways at her commentary.

“Sup, cutie,” the ginger offered a hand. “I’m… uhhh… Nessa! And this is Annie!” She grinned cheekily, elbowing her lanky friend.

Annie? Nessa?

The names clicked into place. Since when did people have names in my nightmares? 

Annie grabbed my backpack strap and yanked, sending me stumbling sideways. "What’s even in this thing? …Peanut butter sandwiches and tiny hammers? Why does your backpack have so many hammers in it?”

"Heh, this is about what I expected," Nessa tapped her chin. "Kinda neat though. Very... traditional."

"Traditional?" Annie turned her head to Nessa. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing, babe," Nessa shrugged. "Do your thing. I wanna see where this is going."

As my tormentors became distracted, I twisted free, my backpack straps slipping from the girl’s fingers. The momentum sent me careening down the hallway.

"Oi! Get back here, Clifford!" Annie snarled.

I ran. 

The hallway stretched onward, doors blurring past on both sides. Each classroom I passed featured smudged interiors: a view of empty desks, a teacher writing nonsensical equations on the blackboard, slightly smudged students looking sternly at me, judging me. 

The clock hanging overhead ticked loudly. Focusing on what time it was, was a struggle.

This was normal dastardly dream logic.

Annie's black, laced boots thundered behind me.

"Running just makes it worse!" she called out, galloping after me. "You know how this ends, dweeb!"

“How does it end?” I yelped.

“You die,” she growled. “Obviously!”

I turned a corner and found myself in another identical hallway. More lockers, more slightly fake-looking doors, more flickering fluorescent lights. The exit sign at the end glowed green, promising escape, but as I ran toward it, it receded, not allowing me to reach it.

I swore and burst into one of the classrooms, slamming the door shut and clicking the locks closed.

"Pretty impressive cardio there, babe," Nessa's voice came from beside me. 

I jerked in surprise. The ginger girl was sitting on a desk, legs crossed. “Sup?”

“How’d you get here?” I demanded.

“Dreamwalking,” she answered. “I’m pretty good at this stuff. On the account of you-know-what.”

"What do you want?” I panted, not sure what Nessa meant.

“Just figurrrring stuff out, I suppose,” she purred. “For now, I’m observing stuff. Understanding.”

“Understanding what?” I demanded.

“Your dream, duh,” she chewed on a gum and popped it. “Oh hey. Gum. Neat.”

The classroom door wobbled, the handle turning slowly. I retreated.

The handle twisted fully, lock clicking open even though I had clearly locked it from my side. The door swung inward with deliberate slowness, revealing Annie's silhouette against the flickering hallway fluorescents.

"Sup, dweeb," she said, stepping inside. Her black boots clicked against the linoleum with each measured step. 

I backed toward the windows, but they were painted on too—just flat gray suggestions of escape.

Nessa watched from her perch on the desk, blowing another bubble. "This is getting spicy."

Annie grabbed my collar and yanked me forward. "You think you can just run from me?" She growled.

"Please, I just need to get to—"

"To what?" Annie shook me, my teeth rattling. "You don't even know what class you're looking for. You're just wandering around… all lost and… delicious."

“Give him a lick!” Nessa encouraged. She received a bothered glare from Annie.

The tall brunette shoved me backward into a desk. The edge caught my hip, sending a sharp ache up my side.

"That's what you've always been, isn't it? Lost. Confused. Weak." She spoke with voices that didn’t belong to her. "No wonder you needed those pills. Couldn't handle reality without chemical help."

"How do you know about—"

"I know everything about you." Annie's silver-gray eyes flared. "Every embarrassing moment. Every failure. Every time you cried yourself to sleep because you couldn't figure out how to be normal."

“Wow, harsh,” Nessa frowned. “I expected some making out… Where’s the making out?”

"You want to know a secret?" Annie ignored the ginger girl, leaned close, her breath cold against my ear, her voice a reverberating whisper composed of my own doubts, my own voice chiding me. "This never ends. You graduate, you grow up, you think you've escaped—but you're always going to be that scared little boy running through hallways, looking for a room that doesn't exist. Looking for a girl that never existed. An imaginary best friend.”

Nessa blinked. “You’re hooking his fears to torment him with his own doubts? Why?!”

I shoved past Annie, desperation overriding fear. She laughed as I stumbled toward the door.

"Run, rabbit, run!" she called after me.

I burst into the hallway. Behind me, Annie's footsteps resumed their steady pursuit. Not running—she didn't need to run. 

The hallway forked ahead. Left or right? Both looked identical, but the left felt... darker somehow. I went right.

Wrong choice.

The corridor dead-ended at a stairwell, metal railings gleaming dully under the stuttering lights. I grabbed the railing and started up, taking the steps two at a time. My breath came in ragged gasps, the backpack bouncing heavily against my spine.

"Going up?" Annie's voice echoed from below. "Not going to circle the same floor forever? There’s nothing above nor below. No escape."

I reached the second landing and kept climbing. Third floor. Fourth. The numbers on the doors stopped making sense—Room 98247, Room Triangle, Room Why.

My foot caught on the next step. Time dilated as I pitched forward, hands grasping for the railing but finding only air. The backpack's weight pulled me backward, momentum carrying me into a sickening tumble.

I bounced off the landing—shoulder, hip, head cracking against concrete. The world spun in gray kaleidoscope patterns. Another impact, this one driving all breath from my lungs. My arm bent wrong, snapping with a sound like breaking pencils.

The final landing rushed up to meet me. My skull met the floor with a wet crack that I felt more than heard. Warmth spread beneath my head, darker gray pooling against lighter gray.

Annie's boots appeared in my fading vision. She crouched down, tilting her head.

"Oops," she said. "That looked like it hurt."

Nessa materialized beside her, whistling low. "Damn. That was more dramatic than expected. Death by gravity."

The gray faded to black. Complete. Empty. Silent.

Then—

Fluorescent lights hummed above me. The smell of floor cleaner. My hands clutched backpack straps.

I stood in the hallway again, the crowd of students ahead. Annie leaned against the lockers, black hair spilling over her shoulders. Nessa lounged beside her, gold eyes already tracking my movement.

"Like, look who we have here, girls," Annie said, the exact same malicious grin spreading across her face. "It's the dweeb."

I didn’t even bother to interact with them. I bolted away from my tormentors down the hallway.

"You can't outrun me forever!" Annie's voice carried down the corridor, but she wasn't running. The monsters never needed to run in these dreams.

I skidded around a corner, nearly colliding with a water fountain that jutted from the wall like a metallic tumor. The hallway ahead stretched on, doors multiplying on either side. Room 404, Room 505, Room LATE, Room YOU'RE-SO-LATE.

Behind me Annie's footsteps remained steady, unhurried. 

Click. Click. Click.

I yanked on a door handle—locked. Another—painted shut. A third opened into a brick wall with "NO ESCAPE" scrawled in what looked like pencil that gleamed wetly.

"This is getting repetitive," Nessa's voice came from above. I glanced up to see her walking on the ceiling, ginger hair hanging upward—or downward?—defying gravity. "Maybe try something different?"

"Different how?" I gasped.

"I dunno. Stop running? Face her? Kiss her?" She shrugged. "This is your dream, no?”

"My dream?" I wheezed.

"Yeah. Whose dream is it then?" Nessa called down from the ceiling. “It’s certainly ain’t my dream. If it was, we'd already be making out on the beach. Is this fun? Are you enjoying this?”

I didn't have an answer. The hallway curved ahead, a gradual bend that shouldn't exist in a school's architecture. My legs burned, lungs screaming for air.

Annie's footsteps remained constant behind me. 

I risked a glance back and immediately wished I hadn't. Annie was closer than she sounded. Taller too, shadow stretching across the floor.

A door appeared on my right—Room 11811. The room I'd been looking for. My hand grabbed the handle, twisted, pushed—

It opened into another hallway. Identical to this one, except Annie was already there, leaning against the lockers ahead of me.

"Surprise," she said flatly.

I backpedaled, stumbling over my own feet. The Annie behind me was still approaching. Two of them now. Dream logic bullshit.

"That's cheating," Nessa commented, now sitting cross-legged on a drinking fountain. "Very creative though. Which one’s the real Shady? Hrm. Are these even Shadies?"

I ducked into a bathroom. The mirror reflections were wrong, just gray blurs instead of my face. The stalls had no doors, offering no hiding spots. Water eerily dripped from a faucet, each drop sounding like a deep, unnerving pulse.

Annie pushed through the door. Definitely taller now, having to duck slightly under the frame. Her black hair blossomed, spreading out into feather-like patterns.

"You know what your problem is?" she asked, advancing slowly. "You think too much. Always analyzing, always worrying, never just... existing."

"That's fucking rich coming from a nightmare," I shot back.

She smiled with shark-like, pure white teeth. 

Then, she lunged. I tried to dodge, but the bathroom was too small. Her hand caught my shoulder, spun me around, and shoved. 

My back hit the mirror, which shattered into a thousand gray fragments.

Each shard reflected a different moment—me at ten, crying about an imaginary friend nobody else could see. Me at thirteen, swallowing pills that made the world feel wrapped in cotton. Me at nineteen, staring at university acceptance letters and feeling nothing but uncertainty about my future.

The second Annie entered the bathroom, just as tall and dark as the first, eyes glowing silver in the gloom.

One of the Annies grabbed me, holding me. The other picked up a jagged mirror shard, advancing towards me with ill intentions.

61: Who’s the Real Shady?

“May I have your attention, please?
May I have your attention, please?
Will the real Starshady please stand up?
I repeat, will the real Starshady please stand up?”

A speaker in the ceiling suddenly came to life with Nessa’s voice.

“Hrmmmphh... We're gonna have a problem here…” The speaker sighed.

I stared at Annie’s reflection in the unbroken mirrors. She was wrong. 

Tall. Dark. Seven feet tall. Massive black antlers. Black claws like elongated blades. I choked. She looked like my imaginary best friend… but wrong. Tall. Monstrous. Antlerred.

Somewhat familiar music burst from the speaker. Of course. I would die to the dream-twisted sound of early 2010’s pop.

"Just peachy," I muttered.

The two Annies circled me, their forms undulating between teenage bully and seven-foot Wendigo with each flicker of the fluorescent lights.

"Y'all act like you never seen a Wendigo before," Nessa's voice boomed from the speaker as a shard of mirror sliced through me.

The pain was immediate, absolute—dream-real in the worst way, silver blood spilling across the floor. I fell, crawling away, leaving a trail of silver behind me.

"Claws on the floor while Ash crawls for the door
You threw him in lakes like never before
Now memory's divorced - You’re not all there, Oh No!”

They descended on me like a pack, tearing, rending. 

I died with a scream.

The dream reset. 

My hands were trembling. The memory of being eviscerated by black claws was too fresh, too damn real.

"But Princess, please remember Ash!" Nessa sang with her own voice and from the school speaker. "Chicka-chicka-chicka, Starshady, remember our pact!"

We were in the damned hallway again, but now there were dozens of Annies in the crowd, all different heights and stages of transformation. Some still looked mostly human. Others were full nightmare fuel—antlers scraping the ceiling, bodies wrapped in feathery shadows that moved wrong.

One of the Annies at the front hesitated. Her silver eyes flickered with confusion. But the others didn't stop. They rushed towards me like a wave of death and claws.

"Look at you, hunting around, grabbing his beating heart—"

And they literally were. One had torn open my ribcage, holding my still-beating heart up like a trophy while I somehow remained conscious enough to watch.

"Ripping the Emperor apart—Wait, but he's your mate though!
Yeah, you definitely got something making you loose,
Not enough focus in dreams, I guess you forgot the truth!
Sometimes you wanna eat his face and just cut loose, huh?
But wait—Remember campfire, remember marshmallow juice?” The speaker sang.

"Marshmallows?" The confused Annie… No, Shady, suddenly shrieked. "CIRCLES! I remember circles!" She suddenly tackled the one holding my heart. "NO! That's—That's mine! He's MINE!"

There were too many of them. Even as Shady tried to defend me, the others overwhelmed her, shoving her aside to continue their feast.

The real Shady tried to block the others. "Stop! STOP! He smells like—he tastes like—I KNOW HIM!"

They did want to eat my face. One of them was actively doing it. The defender-Shady fought three others, her antlers locked with theirs. Sadly, she was one against dozens. The hallway had become crowded with Wendigo-Annies, all hungry for my flesh. 

Their claws took me apart as I screamed.

"My claws are in his chest, my claws are in his chest!" they chanted along with the song.

“But if you'd remember, you'd give him a different kind of death
And that's the message I'm trying to get through your head
You claimed him as yours and now you want him dead?

Of course you're gonna kill what you can't recall
By the time you taste his fear you've lost it all, but wait y'all—
You ain't nothing but soulmates—well, one of you's a cannibal
Who cuts her lover open like a cantaloupe

But if you can remember the weight of shared hugs
Then there's a reason that your heart calls him home
So if you feel what I feel, here's the antidote:
Remember, wave goodbye to ghosts, find your soul, and it goes—”

The speaker sang as I drowned in spilling silver blood.

The defender-Shady was roaring now, fighting desperately but losing ground. "I remember! I REMEMBER! But they don't! My hooks don't remember! They're just hungry! They're so hungry! No, no, no! Stop eating him, damn it!”

Another reset. The defender-Shady was immediately at my side, arms spread.

"Please," she begged the others. "Please, he's our Emperor! Our Ash! Our—"

They tore her away from me, held her down, made her watch as they resumed their feast.

"I CAN'T STOP THEM!" defender-Shady screamed. "Ash, I'm sorry! I can't control them! I’m… I’m so hungry… and now my hooks think you're just prey and I can't—"

“You're Starshady, yes you're the real Shady
All these nightmares just imitating
So won't the real Shady please wake up?
Please wake up, please wake up?

'Cause you're Starshady, yes you're the real
Shady Ash is bleeding and you're demonstrating
So won't the real Shady please wake up?
Please wake up, please wake up?

Remember the mansion? My pasta disasters?
How you called him Emperor Master?
Remember the lake throws? The terrible fear?
How you needed him always near?

Stop eating his liver, that's your Emperor there
The one you marked with antler-scarred care
You're not some mindless monster from the void
You're Princess Aquillianne—not destroyed!”

The speakers sang above me as I died with a smile on my lips. 

Nexxali. Our kitten. Shady. My best friend. I wasn't alone.

Reset.

They attacked from all angles. Defender-Shady tried to shield me with her body but there were too many. Her black feathers were torn away in clumps as she fought.

"I remember the hugs!" defender-Shady sobbed. "I remember everything! But remembering isn't enough! They're me, but also not me! They're what I was! What I could be! What I'm afraid I am!"

I died as they sliced me.

Reset.

“So you're Starshady, yes you're the real Shady
Your memories aren't just fading
So won't the real Shady please wake up?
Please wake up, please wake up?”

Nexxali sang.

This time when we respawned, the real Shady immediately grabbed me and ran. The hallway stretched infinitely but she kept running, carrying me, her breath ragged.

"They're not imitating!" defender-Shady gasped. "They're me! The parts I can't control! The parts that only know hunger!"

Behind us, the horde of Shadies gained ground. Their footsteps sounded like thunder, like an avalanche of claws and teeth.

“You awake yet?” Nexxali asked from the speaker.

"YES! I AM AWAKE!" Shady howled up. "I'm awake in his dream but I can't wake up properly! I can't pull my hooks out! They're tangled in his nightmares, in his fear and I can't—"

They caught us as Shady tripped over a suddenly twisted, warped floor tile, letting go of me as she fell. 

Nightmares don't let you escape that easily.

The defender-Shady fought even harder this time, actually managing to kill one of her doppelgangers. It dissolved into black smoke that immediately reformed as two more.

"Emperor," defender-Shady whispered, looking at me as my intestines were pulled out like party streamers. "My Emperor. I'm so sorry. I'm trying. I'm trying so hard but I'm not whole enough to—"

Reset.

She grabbed me, running.

"I need you," she whispered as she held me. "I need you... but I'm killing you. Over and over. I can feel every death. Every bite. Every claw. It's me doing it… but I can't stop. I’m sorry, Ashy."

“Guess you didn’t scare me enough today?” I asked.

“Guess not,” she sighed. “Sorry.” 

She nuzzled into me, holding me tightly.

“Mrrrrrr,” Nexxali voiced from the speaker. “That takes care of at least one Shady. Let me think… Oh, oh, I know!”

“Hurry up and help!” I yelled at the ceiling.

"She wants to maul you, that's her game," Nexxali's voice sang from the speakers, the new melody burrowing into my panic-addled brain.
"Across these halls without a name…
And your death here won't make you wake,
So how much fear can one boy take?"

Another Annie lunged from a classroom. Defender-Shady spun, kicking her into lockers that rippled like mercury.

"These halls go on forever more, behind each grey-lit classroom door—
She's waiting with her silver eyes, to hear your heartbeat's lullabies!"

Every door we passed spawned another hunter. They were multiplying off my fear. My heart hammered. Shady clutched me tighter.

"Run, rabbit, run through liquid walls, I'll cheer her on through empty halls!
The thrill is in the chase, you see, when predator meets prey-to-be!
She'll pin you down where shadows bend, and whisper... 'this will never end!
Your death's a door, not final rest—tomorrow night, another test!"

“Another night? I don’t want to do this every night,” the Shady holding me whined.

The walls liquefied slightly, chrome surfaces reflecting our desperate flight. Something shifted in my mind—Nexxali was right. 

This wasn't just terror. It was something electric.

Three Annies cornered us. The Shady holding me kicked at them while I searched for escape.

Death as a door. The concept clicked. If death was a door, then maybe...

"In corners where the darkness pools, she breaks all of this dream's rules—
Her claws trace patterns on your skin, while I just watch and purr and grin!
The hunt's foreplay, if truth be told—these nightmare halls where passion's sold!
She feeds on fear but wants much more, behind each rippling metal door!"

Rules. Dreams had rules that could be broken.

"NEXXALI!" Shady roared. "Stop being horny and HELP!"

I focused all of my dream-will on trying to create a door out, a path, a way out of fear. I reached out towards hope, towards friendship, towards the understanding Shady and I established as kids and then as adults when we once again met in my grandfather’s home.

"You'll die a hundred times tonight—each death a kiss, each scream delight!
And when you think you've found escape, she'll pull you back to demonstrate!
These endless hallways know our names—they echo with her little games!
Where Annie plays and Ash must run, until the two become just one!"

"That door!" I pointed ahead of us, opening my eyes. 

Shady saw it too. A colorful door.

We ran forward, the murderous-Shadies pack converging from everywhere. The glowing door grew closer. 

Behind us, dozens of Shadys gained ground.

"So close your eyes and count to three, pretend that you don't want to see—
Dream deep, my dear, she's waiting there, with feathered mane and jet black hair!
But here's the trick, my frightened dear—these dreams are just illusion's sphere!
You hold more power than you know, to change the script and steal the show!”

My hand found the handle. I turned it.

The door exploded open. Light flooded everything.

We burst onto the rooftop filled with brilliant color—

"It doesn't have to be so grim—this playground's yours to sink or swim!"
Rewrite her hunt to lover's game, and set these silver halls aflame!
With every death, you can respawn—turn predator to prey at dawn!
Make out against these dreary walls—transform the fear to passion's calls!"

We rushed outside into bright, radiant sunlight.

The school floated on an endless purple-blue-silver ocean. 

Other buildings drifted past like enormous ships—the Clifford mansion, a Blockbuster Video store that closed when I was twelve, the Cascade movie theater, Cascade Books & Nooks cafe, all sailing majestically across dream-waves.

The rooftop itself bloomed with violet grass, cherry trees sprouting from ventilation units. The Annies emerged onto the sunlight and stopped chasing, staring left and right in confused wonder.

"Pretty," one whispered, catching falling petals. "Not gray. Pretty. No… fear.”

"Meow! Meow!" I spotted Nexxali sitting atop the statue of Cascade founder Lord Aaron Chandler drifting by the school. "Ha ha ha ha! He he he!" She laughed.

The eternal sunset painted everything golden. The hunting pack spread across the rooftop, exploring. Some lay in the grass. Others watched the Blockbuster float by with expressions of nostalgia.

"Phew. We made it out of that stupid dream," the Shady clinging to me breathed out, her heart beating fast. "You finally found the way out. Good job, Ashy!"

"Nexy’s song helped." I looked at the serval who hopped off the statue and walked across the water to the edge of the school’s rooftop and then grinned at us. "Even if someone was being insufferably horny about it!”

"You're welcome!" Nexxali giggled, climbing over the parapet, leaning down and kissing me with her snout.

“Couldn’t you just order us to get out here with your voice without the whole ridiculous rapping and singing?” Shady demanded.

"Nu-huh.” Nexxali shook her head. “This isn't my dream, I cannot control it directly. Charmchain requires precise targeting and intent. A physical target. But dreams… Dreams are slippery. The subconscious resists direct orders. It's like trying to grab water."

"So you sang instead?" I asked.

"Yep. Two songs. One for Shades, the other for you. Music bypasses resistance," she nodded. "It weaves through the cracks, plants subtle suggestions rather than commands while describing what’s happening. Dreams respond better to rhythm and metaphor than 'stop eating Ash immediately.'"

Several of the Wendigo-Annies had gathered around us now, no longer hostile. One reached out tentatively toward a cherry blossom, then pulled back as if afraid she might destroy it.

"Hrmmm. They're all me," Shady said, looking at her duplicates and finally releasing me from her bosom. “But I can’t seem to get them together. They’re just… doing whatever the fuck they wanna. Why can’t I get my brain hooks in order?”

"Mrrrwwlll.” The serval stretched, tail swaying. Her ginger and black fur caught the golden dream-light. "Whatever the Abyss you did to mess yourself up, it created this. These smell like basically disconnected… pieces of your psyche, sheared bits of your soul, Fractal Engine and mind that aren’t under your direct control. They’re… shards of your Astral self you’ve somehow managed to slice off yourself. They're existing on their own. Weirdest shit I’ve seen in a dream.”

“Shit. So did I… hunt Ashy last night too?” Shady asked.

“I dunno,” the catgirl shrugged. “I wasn’t there. You probably did. Wendigos feed on fear to maintain psychic bonds. I guess when a Wendigo soul gets torn up… you get this mess."

Shady looked at me.

“If you did chase and murder me, I don't remember it,” I said. “I don’t often remember my dreams.”

“M'sorry,” She slid to her knees, hugging me gently. She offered me a tentative lick, tail wrapping around my leg.

“It's fine,” I patted her feathery mane. “It's better now. They're calm.”

"Mmmmm," Shady murmured, turning her skull-head and watching a RadioShack drift past on its own little island, "your subconscious is weird."

"Says the girl who spent the past few hours trying to eat me in various creative ways."

"That's just love, baby." Shady grinned.

"That's therapy. Gonna need sooo much therapy after this.”

She laughed at that.