Dream: Barbie

7/23/23

Barbie, like the doll, was walking through a meadow with a few scattered trees next to a reflective, motionless,pristine, and undisturbed lake. Or perhaps it was too small for a lake. A pond? Her boyfriend, Ken, was there. As well as her three younger sisters. They were walking and talking with each other, planning a picnic. Chelsey, the youngest sister, pointed out some deer in the distance. The deer were jumping into the brush of the nearby forest.

But then a nearby bush stood up and jumped and down, waving its arms emphatically. Looking closer, we realized it was not a bush; but rather, it was a stout little man no taller than Chelsey. The little man was coated horn-to-hoof in long bristling fur, and he had antlers like a stag and his feet were the hooves of a goat. He jumped up and down, waving his arms emphatically while babbling incoherent gibberish.

Barbie’s little sisters stepped back from the creature, mouths open in surprise and fear. Ken steps between the girls and the little man and slowly puts his arms in front of him palms-down as though pressing them down on an invisible table. It was nonverbal communication for “Calm down” and “What’s wrong?”

I don’t know if the beastman understood Ken’s intention, but another beastman arose nearby. A beastman that we also thought was a bush at first. This new beastman kicks and stomps the ground and stretches his arms out towards Ken palms flat as though pushing against an invisible wall.

Ken yelps and falls to his hands and knees. Fur overgrows his clothes. He transforms into a goat. The two beastmen laugh hysterically. One of them falls on its back and literally rolls on the ground with laughter. Barbie and her sisters are terrified. Stacy screams. The beastmen stop laughing and Skipper covers Stacy’s mouth with a hand. The two beastmen stare at them. Silent mouth open, frozen mid-laughter. Ken the goat bleats angrily. This draws the attention of the Beastmen. Barbie grabs Chelsey’s hand and taps Skipper on the shoulder. Skipper nods. Time to go. The four girls turn and run at a mad-sprint. Barbie with Chelsey, and Skipper with Stacy. “Wait, Barbie. What about Ken?” Chelsey cries. Barbie doesn’t answer. She doesn’t have the time. Chelsey can barely keep herself upright, dragged alongside Barbie. While Skipper is older and kept her composure, Stacy’s fear overtakes her. She breaks away from Skipper, sprinting past Barbie and Chelsey, pushing herself to the limits of physical ability. Her shoes spring against the grass and dirt, slamming to the ground with such impact, that the heels of her shoes digging the dirt, uprooting grass, kicking up dust. Skipper calls out to Stacy to be careful.

“Wait for us, Sta-” Skipper’s voice chokes out and we hear a thud behind us. Barbie looks over shoulder but Skipper is nowhere to be seen. The two beastmen are pursuing, although only one is very close. The other beastman is trying to kick a goat off its leg. The near beastman is behind a deer. Specifically, a doe. The doe has fallen on its side, scrambling to stand up but is having difficulty doing so.

“Barbie, we have to save them!” Chelsey protests. The little girl struggles to wrench free from Barbie’s biting clamp jaw grip.

“We can’t help them if we get caught.” Barbie rasps. We hear a crack ahead of us. Stacy topples to the ground and screams in pain. The beastman is getting closer. Barbie can’t drag Stacy with her. But Stacy is still quite a ways up ahead. “Get ready, Chelsey.” Barbie says, “We’re gonna go to the right.”

“What?” Chelsey asks, “Woah, wait!” They turn to go to the right. The beastman shakes its head between Stacy and Barbie, trying to decide who to pursue. It slows down and walks to Stacy. Barbie drags Chelsey despite her protests. “We have to save them, Barbie!” Chelsey exclaims, “How could you leave them?”

Barbie has lost her pursuers. And Chelsey is giving her a really hard time about it. Barbie decides that they’re gonna need tools to build a shelter. Chelsey complains that she doesn’t want to stay here. She wants to find her sisters and Ken and leave.

Barbie notes they are now in a heavily wooded forest with thick brush and tree cover. She thinks they have a good chance of staying hidden if they stay here.

Using sharpstones, sticks and the flexible of green plants and trees. She crafts a make-shift axe and bow. Similarly, she crafts arrows. Chelsey doesn’t like how Barbie is preparing to say here long term. Barbie sets off into the brush and returns a few minutes later with a dead deer in tow. “Barbie, you monster!” Chelsey screams, her face pale. Barbie waves her hands reassuringly, swearing only hunted what was necessary for them to survive. “We need the hides for clothes, bedding, and a tent.” Barbie says, “We’ll use the bones for better tools and we’ll cook and eat the meat.”

“How can you say things like this after seeing Skipper turned into a deer.” Chelsey says, mortified, “This might be our sister!”

Barbie opens her mouth to argue but looks down at the deer and closes her mouth. She pokes and prods the deer, inspecting it. “Don’t worry, Chelsey. Skipper is a Doe, this a Buck.” Barbe says.

Chelsey frowns. “How can you be sure, Barbie?” Chelsey asks skeptically, “It doesn’t have antlers.” Barbie glances at the underside of the deer. “I can just tell.”

“Even so, it could be a person.” Chelsey says, “Our family probably isn’t the first ones to become animals.”

Barbie builds a tent and sets up necessities for wilderness survival. A roasting stick held up above a fire by two tripods. And a solar panel farm to power her computer with satellite internet. Chelsey grows anxious about her missing family. Barbie continues to progress on survival until she transcends space and time, becoming enlightened. She looks directly at me. “Get me out of here.” I frown. Is she talking to me? I look to my left and my right. I’m in the basement of my house in the laundry room where the freezer used to be. I’ve got a desk with a computer, keyboard, screen, and mouse setup. Strange. I don’t have such a setup in real life. Nor do I have any computers downstairs.

I look back at the screen. The subtitles are glitching out, trying to match what Barbie says as she goes off-script. She demands I help her. Meanwhile, I see figures in the distance, closing in. The satyrs. Chelsey sees them too and tries to get Barbie’s attention. But Barbie is staring angrily at me through the screen. It’s too much. I press on ESC, pausing the game as a tiny menu pops up in the center of the screen and the rest of the screen is dimmed. The satyrs freeze, the wind rustled leaves cut off, and Barbie’s face is blocked by the menu. I take a deep breath and stand up from the desk.

I go to the adjacent room, also in the basement. This room has a couch facing a TV where my younger brother is sitting. He is looking at his phone. I tell him about the game and that it’s scaring me. He scoffs. “Scared of a Barbie game?” He asks, “Let me try.” He follows me back to the desk. I sit in the chair and unpause the game to show him what’s going on. I need to deal with the satyrs before I let him take control. Barbie’s gone. Chelsey’s missing too. The Satyrs sprint as dark blurs on the screen, crafting their own machinery, rerouting the solar panels to power their malevolent device. I exclaim how odd it is that Barbie and her sister are missing. My little brother notes that it doesn’t seem like a Barbie game. It looks like a space-exploration game. “Space-exploration?” I ask.

“Yeah, that’s clearly Mars.” He says, pointing at the red dirt ground. A desert, void of all vegetation and life. The satyrs are gone, but their machine remains. It looks like a transformer. As in, those massive collections of electrical boxes that are fenced off and are sometimes found beneath those massive telephone towers. The tent and setup for Barbie’s camp remains. But no trace of Barbie, Chelsey, or the Satyrs can be found. My brother loses interest. I notice that the subtitles are still going.

Barbie: “We’ll find a way to save them. Trust me.”

Chelsey: “I trust you, Barbie. But I’m scared.”

Barbie: “Don’t worry. We’re safe now.”

I can’t believe my eyes. It’s almost as if Barbie is… I’m in a dark neighborhood. I’m crawling on the floor towards a tall house. My tentacles grip the brick wall. I climb without footholds. I pull myself onto the roof to find another house rising from the roof. This is my target. As my eyes light upon each window, words appear above the entrance to describe the room and its difficulty. Child’s Bedroom. Difficulty Hard. I glance at a lower window that looks like there might be a rocking chair up against the window. Recreation Center. Difficulty Easy. I choose this room. I crawl up to the window and slide it open. Then I push myself inside. In the room, I find myself outside in a fairground at night. A game stall where you throw darts at balloons stands. Blue and white striped awning hangs over it. My target tinkles with reflective light. A small blue ribbon tied around a particular dart on the board. This seems fairly easy. I approach the stall. But as I do, it grows larger. Soon, it towers over me, each dart so large I could ride it like a horse. Each balloon so big it could hold a house. I climb up the wooden side of the stall then upside-down on the awning. I drop down onto the backboard where the balloons are pinned and where the darts are stuck stabbed into the soft backing. I’ve nearly reached the shiny, sparkling dart when I see movement in the corner of my eye. I turn to see a human. This human is proportioned to the stall as if the stall was regular size. Or in other words, the human was a giant. He yanks a dart from a bin behind the stall and hurls it at me. The round point skewers me and sends me flying backwards.

I open my eyes and sit up with a start. It’s dark out. The house in front of me, tall and familiar. I climb up the brick wall with the barbed teeth cups of my tentacles. On the roof, I see the second building. I aim for the window that holds the fairground. I again see the stall. I look for the stall-attendant but can’t see him. So I approach the stall. Again, it grows to monstrous proportions, so I climb the side and up the awning. This time, instead of climbing down the backboard, I drop from the awning, aiming to fall directly on the sparkling dart. With a blur of movement I am sent hurtling backwards as I am impaled by another dart. I rise again. Climb to the roof and then through the window. This time, I don’t approach the stall. I instead back away. Once the stall is small, I reach forward and grab the entire thing in my hand, bringing it up to my face. I see the little man in the stall. Yelling angrily, and throwing darts. I block my eyes with my hand, so he can’t hurt me. I reach in with my finger to grab the sparkling dart, but I can’t grip it because my fingers are too big. The little man stabs my thumb with a dart. I drop the stall, pulling my hand back reflexively. My thumb draws blood and I yelp in pain.

I open my eyes and sit up. There is a building in front of me. Again. I climb it to the roof where a second building stands. I climb through the bottom left window again. I back away but not as much this time. I take a few steps. Reach forward to see if I can grab the stall, then take a few more steps back until I’m big enough to reach it. I can see the dart. I can grab it. It’s perfect. My fingers can still easily get a good grip. I reach my hand in to–a dart hits my wrist. I open my eyes. I roll my eyes in annoyance.

I back away a whole lot. The stall is a mere centimeter across. I can’t possibly grab anything from there. I lift it up and throw it against the ground, then crush it beneath my foot. Then I walk towards it. It grows larger as I approach. Soon, the mountain of debris towers above me. I climb up the broken wood shafts that used to hold up the awning. I scamper between torpedo-darts and get caught in the plastic of popped balloons. For several minutes, I fear I might be stuck in the popped balloons as it bunches up beneath me and slides beneath my feet. Yet, I eventually crawl my way out. There, I find the sparkling dart. Beautiful. As I take hold of the dart’s point, I see the man’s limp body lying mangled on the ground. I squeeze my hands around the dart. Pain. I accidentally prick my hand against the point. I arise. I am still on the roof this time. Light pours out the window. I smile. That room has been completed.

I climb in through another window. I find myself in a tower. Spiral staircase rises upwards. Moonlight shines down through a skylight. Sheep on the hill. He gazes down from above. Hovering in the air. Who is this? Resonant voice echoes off the walls. Medieval castle architecture. I’m maybe not a blue yellow. There is a white spite of hate. There are others in the castle. I flee. I flee because the walls are crumbling. Shepherd is back and I must escape. The man behind is flung into the air as Shepherd lowers through a hole in the ceiling. Process and analysis. I cannot leave. I charge towards a set of double-doors. The bricks spread from the wall to cover the wooden doors.

Shepherd’s gaze falls upon me. His many eyes stretching towards me on tendrils. My every thought assumes it to be divine. Not an angel, not deity either. But something about it strikes me as holy. It speaks to me. Overbearing peace and calm bludgeons me. A window. Shepherd notices it too late. I jump and break through. Bricks closing behind me as I leap through shattered glass.

Past the moat on the field of battle. Armies clash. I cross the water to join the fray. Shepherd long forgotten. I speak with a high-ranking officer to discover that reinforcements from the mainland are supposed to arrive but have been delayed. He sends me to find what’s stopping them and get them going.

I take a ship to the mainland where I teach people about the doctrines revealed to me by the Shepherd. As I share this message, many profess their belief in the Shepherd and worship it, though the Shepherd itself does not make an appearance. Some particularly zealous followers claim to be capable of performing miracles, such as healing, through power given to them by the Shepherd. I am skeptical of these claims despite being the one to have taught them of the Shepherd in the first place. The Shepherd has not given me any power. Soon, the religion takes hold. But even though I am its founder, I am not the leader. Those capable of the miraculous feats rise to the top of the hierarchy. I’m a common preacher. One day, a high-ranking miracle-worker gives me a command.

I am to convert the household of some foreigners. I go to their home. I knock on the door. The door creaks open under the impact of my knuckled fist, but no one comes to answer. I peer inside and see doorways. A doorway to the left leading to a dark bathroom. Two doors on the wall opposite of me. The door on the left in front of me is slightly ajar, revealing a bed which appears to be occupied by a sleeping woman. Based on appearance, I’d guess she’s… Asian? Maybe? I’m really bad at determining race. The door on the right in front of me is closed and locked. The doorway to the right leads to a kitchen. I am content to leave and say I tried my best. But I hear the familiar hum of a hovering entity. The Shepherd. I jump into the house and slam the door behind me. I lock it tight. The woman in the bed is still asleep.

I explore the kitchen, passing through to the living room. The house is empty except for the woman sleeping in the bedroom. I find a closet and hide. But I hide in vain. The ceiling opens as plaster and wood peel away to reveal the Shepherd. The divine presence grabs me with its crab-like claws. My bones snap in my very skin. I scream, its legs grip my sides, pulling me close to it.

I sit in the living room talking to an Asian couple. I discuss the divinity of the Shepherd and his holy mission to guide us mortals to the safety of his sheepfold. The Asians mention how this seems similar to some religions they’ve heard about before. Specifically, they mention that jews and Christians seem similar. I hear the voice of the Shepherd vibrating through the walls. How foolish for me to think I could ever escape. But I’ve succeeded in my task. The couple is converted. I head towards the door to leave. I open the door and look back over my shoulder at the inside of the house. Doorway to the left is the bathroom. Doorway to the right is the kitchen, which leads to the living room. Two doors on the opposite wall. One on the right is closed. The one of the left is slightly ajar. I notice a difference. A chair is blocking the door from closing. And there is a sig hanging by a rope from the door handle. “Do Not Enter.” That’s funny. A sort of do not disturb sign.

I narrow my eyes. That woman is still in the bed. I could have sworn I had been teaching them the doctrines and edicts of the Shepherd in the living room. When did she go to bed? She’s not asleep. Black tendrils from the left side of the room, which I can’t see behind the door, grasp the woman pressing her mouth shut. She struggles against her monstrous captor. As she turns away from whatever is holding her, she sees me in the entrance and waves her arms to get my attention. Tendrils squeeze her arms to her side and she muffles cries for help. The chair falls into the room out of the doorway without being touched. And the door slams shut, causing the door sign to fall from the handle and land on the ground.

I leave to see a ship arriving at the dock wit wounded soldiers coming ashore. I see three in particular. One of them expresses relief that he can return home. He considers himself lucky, though he has a bloody stump where his left arm should be. The second expresses annoyance and frustration with the lack of reinforcements. He complains that they sent an envoy a month ago and have not received any word. The third speaks reverently, quietly expressing gratitude for the opportunity to be in the city hen the Shepherd is visiting. He talks about the miracles performed by the leaders of the Shepherd’s flock.

Trailer home. It’s a trailer home. I’m in a trailer home park. Gravel roads criss cross between these trailer homes. Men in suitcoats and sunglasses come to my trailer park home. They insist on buying the trailer home. We are short on money, so we are inclined to accept the deal even if it means we won’t have a place to stay. However, I am hesitant about the deal, though the rest of my nonexistent companions out vote me in favor of seeling the trailer home. Sine if the priests from my religion, the Shepherd’s flock, set up ambushes to mug those crossing by gravel road. I know this because they jump out to ambush me, and they get quite far in the robbery until they realize who I am and apologize for their mistake. I am quite worried what they will do to others. I begin to hack the programs used by the men in suits