The Holder of the Last Dream

Return to wherever you live, or more appropriately, wherever you call home. Close all the blinds, windows, doors, as well as turn off all the lights, televisions, basically anything that could distract you. Go to your sleeping chamber, lay down, and drift into sleep. This will be a normal, predicable, and relaxing sleep. When you awake however, don't get up, just stay laying down. Once again, lay there until you fall back to sleep. Since you are already rested, this may take a long time, but keep with it.

Repeat this cycle. Each time, it will take longer and longer for you to fall asleep, but since your body is not used to the situation, you will start to have choppy, grainy, and slightly disturbing dreams. They will fade in and out of your head, coming in distorted and twisted, and seem almost alien to you. It will be like an old VHS tape trying to tune itself, with mistakes and lines flying all over an image you just can't make out.

Soon this static will consume all, and it will feel you no longer are observing this world, but rather, are a part of it. It will be a simple location, a school, a playground, or something similar. It will go in and out of focus, as if you truly trying to tune it to your mind. Explore this world, touch it, smell it, listen to it. Nothing will seem right, yet nothing on the surface seems wrong, yet a cold, sinking feeling will be in your stomach.

Eventually, you will be tapped on the shoulder. It would be in your best interest not to turn around. A hand will extend by your side, and in it will be two little glass tubes. One will be filled with red sand, and the other blue. These will be the only truly clear things in this world. Take them both, and quietly thank the figure. With that, the room will darken, and you will be awake in your room.

Arise from your bed, and walk to the nearest door, and open. Instead of what would be a closet, your living room, or what not, when you open it, you will walk into what seems like a new plane. It will feel as if you are floating in space, with stars, planets, nebulae, and other celestial objects surrounding you. Take it all in, for it truly will be a beautiful sight. As you look, one by one each one will dim, slowly. It may take hours, but soon the sky will be black except for a couple of faint glowing stars in the distance.

"What have you brought me?" A booming voice will call, with the remaining stars illuminating in rhythm with its words. The great volume will shake the sky, and those stars will scatter, as if falling off the walls of existence.

Reach out, and open your hand, and inside will be your sand tubes. Both will seem to float over your palm. Choose which one you want to part with, open it, and spread the sand all over the place. The dust will fly away, in patterns, glowing, as it covers the ends of the universe. Take the other one, and put it in your pocket. Everything will illuminate again, smile and bow, and thank the voice for its help. Walk over to the door, and enter back into your room.

Take the tube you didn't give, and pour it all over your bed. Get in, and drift to sleep.

Now if you kept the red tube, you will dream some of the most brutal, and disturbing nightmares you have ever experienced. Time will flow like normal, and any pain or sadness you experience will be as real as you being awake. Just stay alive, that's all that matters, for if you die in your dream, you never will awake.

The blue tube is just the opposite, you will have an unbelievable sleep, and dance forever with women, friends, anything you desire. Anything you could have ever wanted will be yours. It will be bliss like nothing you ever experienced.

Now, it seems like there is no reason not to take the blue tube, but realize whatever you take, the rest of mankind gets what you gave away, and they will experience it for the next year. Do you want to reward the planet, or torture them? Is it a gift or a punishment. Would you experience any guilt, as you walk down depressed and frightened streets as the night begins to fall? This is your choice, and yours alone. Remember, one night of bliss against hundreds of pain for mankind.

When you wake from this dream, get up, and fold up the sheet you spilled sand over. Whenever you cover yourself with this sheet from now on, you will stay awake and not fatigue. When wearing it, your body might ache, and your spirits could be low, but your eyes will not become weary.

This "cloak" is object 472 of 538. With it, you will never dream again, because you have been to the peak of the Sublime.