Paper Bullets

Yet again, another one of those highly disturbing dreams, bordering on nightmarish visions that I feel the need to capture in words.

I am surrounded by happy friendly people, all of whom I know well in my dream, but none of whom I have ever met in real life.  We are at my house, having some type of co-op college party.  I was taking a shower when all of a sudden, the sound of air raid horns blare off in long harsh, nerve jangling screams.  I shut off the water and ran to the window, just in time to see smoke rising up from the distance, as jets fly in all directions, firing projectile weapons at something I could barely make out.  I would have focused my attention on what the jets were firing upon except that my eyes were distracted by what was coming towards us, from the ground.

Extraterrestrials.

They were obviously not from this world.  They were non-humanoid in form, and they were charging straight at us.  In a panic, I pulled a couple of towels from the rack, draped one around my still-dripping hair, and one around my body in sarong style, and ran out to the living room.  Several of the girls pulled  my hand.  Come, come!  We have to leave this area!  As they were ushering me out, all I could think of was, I have no clothes on! I don’t even have shoes on!  But I had no choice. Ignoring the amused looks coming from the guys, I ran out with the girls, into what looked like a battle ground.  No. Let me rephrase that.

It was a fucking war zone.

I was horrified.  There was artillery raining down on us from both sides of the war, and the girls were shooting up at whatever and whoever was shooting down, using some type of hand missile launchers.  One of the girls handed me a missile launcher and told me to aim it at the extraterrestrials.  I took a good look at the weapon that had been unceremoniously dumped into my hand and gave a hysterical laugh.

There was no fricking way this thing could possibly do anything to anybody.  It was a missile launcher that used, of all things as ammunition, paper rounds.  In essence, they were shooting paper missiles into the air at a people who had the technology to come here from astronomical distances through space and time.  To my utter amazement, the paper bullets exploded on contact into millions of pieces of colorful confetti and folded origami cranes.  All the tiny paper shrapnel floated to the ground in dancing waves of celebratory cheer, even as the war raged on.

I threw the weapon to the ground in disgust.  I did not want to shoot at anybody anyhow, extraterrestrials or not.  Their lives were just as precious as mine was, and their souls, just as connected to mine as I was to myself.  I was damned if I was going to treat them any differently than I treated the people around me at my co-op party.

I stood under that darkened sky, filled with smoke and artillery of every type, trying my best to garner all the love and good will I had inside my body.  With every ounce of my being, I threw up my arms and aimed blasts of love and good will into the sky.  Alas, it was completely inadequate.  There was just too much chaos around me.  The sky was too large for my puny little effort.  I was panicking fast, but I knew I could not succumb to the fear of my inadequacy.  Gathering up all the pure chi that I had left inside my core inner being, I cast waves of love out in a bubble shape, as wide as I could, and then I shut my eyes and held my ground.  If I died, then at least I died with thoughts of love and peace.

Well, it must have been quite peaceful because I actually fell asleep in my dream.  I was awakened later, by a couple of the girls who had pulled me out.  They were smiling at me as if trying to reassure me that all was well.  I got up and looked around, and was amazed that I was lying in the middle of a huge impact crater.  The ridges around me perfectly matched the ring (or dome) of love and goodwill I had been trying to project.  It seemed then, that my love and good will could not protect me or anyone around me, from the war that was going on around me, but at least I had not died from the craziness around me.

The girls led me back to my house, and again, I had to avert my eyes from the merriment and smiles I felt coming from the guys who were still at the house.  I was painfully aware of my filthy body, covered by the grime of warfare, clothed in nothing but a bath towel.  It was at about this time that I thankfully woke up.  I have not had a chance yet, to analyze this dream, but it bothered me so much that I think–I think I’m going to go take a shower.