"Everybody's out on the run tonight, but there's no place left to hide"

[trenchkamen]

The interior of the school looked similar to the 100 building of Saguaro, but the exterior was that of my elementary school in Amarillo -- a huge field to the north bordered by a cow pasture. It was pitch-black and isolated. All the lights were on in the school, but it still seemed distinctly like "night" in the buildings.

It was a really odd contest. We were assigned homerooms (much like graduation), and when outside we were supposed to check with whom I think was one of my old English teachers, who was talking to a long line of people and checking people off of a clipboard. I remember circumventing the line to her side and asking her if I was exempt, and she somehow told me (I forgot what was said, but it wasn't direct and was rather distracted) that I had won the battle. There was still a long line of people waiting to talk to her, but it made sense at the time. I asked her where the Kuroneko was (yes, from Trigun); she pointed to the snaking line of people who were "out" of the game, and I saw him wandering between peoples' ankles, visible only because of his glowing eyes. For whatever reason, I was impelled to run toward him, crouched down low, and mumble "kittykitty come here kitty".

I was then back in the building, looking for somebody or something, though I forgot what it was, and both the room I was supposed to be in and the one next door were being headed by clones of my old Spanish teacher. He said something that indicated that I had, again, won the battle, but the room was full of people who were presumably "out", and he would just smile blankly at any of my questions. I never progressed beyond the doorway in either instance, and what happened after that is not clear, but I remember at some unclear point during the dream, I had stood in front of somebody who was being threatened with a gun and demanded that the aggressor (it was a female teacher, I think) either lower the weapon or shoot both of us. She backed down, apparently impressed by this show of bravado, and I think it somehow contributed to my place as a victor.

In the real Battle Royale, I would have been shot immediately, just before the person behind me would have been shot as well, and no glory whatsoever would have come of it.

I remember specific teachers involved more than specific students with whom I interacted. I had a sense of being closely followed by Samson at least half of the dream, but I never saw him or spoke to him directly to any extent of my knowledge. There was more of a sense of unspoken communication. He may have been the student I saved (it would make perfect sense, wouldn't it, using Storybook Logic).

Oddly enough this was less of an anxiety-inducing dream than most I have been having lately; it was obvious this was a mock-sport used to test which student had the most valor, strategic skill, and clarity-of-thought under pressure. That is a bullshit way to measure that, though. It was entirely bureaucratic and had all of the sterility of a field trip. It's so damn easy to say that you'd take a bullet for somebody else when you know it's not actually going to happen, as it is to stay calm during a drill, when you know nothing bad is actually going to happen.


Of course I've wondered what a real Battle Royale-like situation would be like should it have happened to my class; I'm sure few people who are familiar with the story have not meditated on that concept at least to some extent. Anybody have any theories? I, of course, fantasized on myself as the Mimura Shinji figure (he was the hacker), but when it comes right down to it I'm a script kitty at best. I'd be better at making the bombs.

Is it bad if I wish the dream had been more hardcore?

Oh, and on a somewhat similar note:


How'd it get here? Whose is it? You don't want to know.

How Skary is YOUR journal?