GrUeberFest 06: Round 1 - "The Stuff Dreams Aren't Made Of" (474 hits)
Category: NoneLabels: Contests
Rating: 1.75 on 23 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by kaos-king (antius777) (View user info) at 2006-09-25 09:29:25 EDT
The encampments had sprung up all around the edge of the desert, shabby little holes dug into the ground with tattered fabrics held up with broken sticks to act as tents. If you headed further into what used to be the city, you might be able to find a stray remnant in the ruins to help sturdy your home. Of course, if you looked away for a moment , it was likely to be stolen. Individuals here attacked for less than a blanket.
Anything to remind them of their former lives.
What had started out as a small band of refugees had grown recently in exponential numbers. No one was sure why, or how this had even been allowed to happen. Perhaps those in power were not aware. Perhaps they wanted everyone to gather together in one place so they could swoop down from on high. Or perhaps they simply no longer cared.
Things had started out differently. Those who had fled to the desert's brink had wanted something better, something more than what hollow promises the city once held. However, as the encampment grew, so did the old ways. Greed and murder, lust and injustice. Decadence became a general way of life and those that spoke out were quickly silenced.
Here in this place of misery, David shuffled along past a group of make-shift shelters. The sounds of copulation came to his ears through the thin material, grunting and moaning. Some had found solace in carnal activities, if they still could perform. Many sold their bodies for other necessities or vices. David had his own vice, but the spilling of his seed was not part of it.
He had to travel through this area of the encampment from where he had once bedded down to reach his destination. All along the way, offers came to him from men and women alike. The few children present even sauntered up his way, baring flesh for him to touch and taste. He dismissed them all, nonchalantly in manner, as so not to offend any rogue enforcers of the whores that may be lurking about.
It was a trade and barter system, really. Each section had its own den of sin. Some of the coin might have changed since before, but the end result was still the same. Pleasure and content, a sense of escape. But no one really escaped, that was the irony.
David followed a small path and came around to another grouping of tents. He passed a number of them, knowing which one he wished to be a patron of. He had come many times before to Garcia's and he was sure that the man would have the product he desired. Too often he had given to Garcia, and soon David knew he would be forced to pay a price higher than he might truly be able to.
As he came up to the Mexican's tent, David saw a slim woman walk out carrying a battered shoe box. Another satisfied customer. David momentarily wondered what she had given him for the contents, what she had been willing to part with. He had been fool enough to ask Garcia once what he did to receive the products that David so desperately longed for. Garcia had threatened to never do business with him again should David feel so curious in the future.
He stood outside the pale blue tent and coughed twice, as per the custom. Garcia bade him enter and David flipped back the fabric, walking in. The Mexican sat on a broken wooden crate, a wobbly card table set up next to him. Upon it and on the floor beneath sat piles of cardboard boxes of all shapes and sizes. Crumpled cigarette packs, toy containers, food packages - all types.
"You're back soon," said Garcia in his usual slow voice.
"I'd like another," David said evenly.
"You can barely stand. I'm surprised you made it here," replied Garcia.
"I'm fine."
"Do you even have a place left to take it?" asked the Mexican dealer.
"I have a place," said David.
Garcia chuckled. "If you say so. What were you in the mood for this time? Maybe a little bit of a..."
"Something around ten years old," interrupted David.
"Now that," smiled Garcia, "Is gonna cost you. You're not gonna have much left after our little transaction here."
David said nothing and just held out his arm.
Garcia shrugged. He stood up and rummaged around in his crate for a moment until he pulled out an old Gatorade bottle. It was half filled with a thick reddish-brown substance. The rusty scalpel was already in his right hand.
"Shit man, I still haven't sold off the rest of your essence from your last visit," sighed Garcia as he sliced into David's wrist.
David stood there impassively as his blood drained out into the filthy Gatorade bottle. He felt nothing as he watched it fill to the top, no pain, no sense of horror. He noticed his image waiver slightly as Garcia squeezed the last few drops from his veins and he knew that he had limited time left. David also knew he didn't care.
Garcia screwed the cap back on the bottle and put it back in his crate, the scalpel already hidden back in a pocket. He leaned over to the rickety table and grabbed a tiny jewelry box from the corner. It still looked in mint condition.
"Do you wanna know what it is?" asked Garcia.
"I'd rather be surprised," replied David as he walked from the tent, placing the small box in a secure pocket.
David knew that weakness would set in soon enough, so he moved quickly. Out through the section he had came and past the area of gamblers. Cutting around the part of the settlement that housed the brutal warmongers, David stepped out into the desert itself. A few outcroppings of rocks were scattered about the barren land and he headed towards a large jagged peak of stone.
Growing tired, he made it just in time to collapse against the flat side of the rock, a piece large enough to block him from view from the encampment. Granted, someone may have seen him come out here, but he only needed a few minutes. Those minutes would all be worth it. He had gladly shed his blood for this, and whoever had gave it up had got something they wanted in return. True, soon there would be nothing left to him, nothing at all, but that didn't matter in a place like this.
David pulled the jewelry box from his pocket, lifted it to his face and opened it.
- He was ten years old again. He was riding a bike for the first time, his father pushing it from behind. He was laughing and yelling and almost crying because he was so excited. His mother cheered him on from the front yard, his dog "Pooches" tied up under the tree and barking. He felt the summer sun on his face and he was still alive. -
David lurched back out of the memory that was not his and dry heaved. He had lived in the city and never knew how to ride a bike. His father had left the family when he was seven. He had never had a dog. This had been a memory from another, someone else's dream that he had bought and experienced. And it had been glorious.
As David lay weeping in the desert, he thought about all the dreams he had pillaged since his time here. So many, he had lost count. Anything to make him feel alive again. He grew weaker with every giving of his "blood," and soon he wouldn't exist anymore, not even here. Here, in the depth of Hell where dreams were harvested and sold like drugs to the damned.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
"For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,/ When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,/ Must give us pause." - Hamlet, William Shakespeare
User Reviews
Submitted by hour_man (user info) at 2006-10-05 12:00:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
fuck
Submitted by ghola (user info) at 2006-10-04 22:50:11 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
almost forgot to vote for this
Submitted by Sacrilicious (user info) at 2006-10-04 19:44:30 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Anansie (user info) at 2006-10-04 16:12:59 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
I really like the premise. It didn't scare me though. It was more sad than anything else.
Submitted by Anansie (user info) at 2006-10-04 16:12:08 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
1.5.
Submitted by Orgasmatron (user info) at 2006-10-04 14:45:04 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I really liked this. Good character development, and I love how quickly you set up the wasteland of hell. No wasted words here.
Oh, and by the way, when I read the quote at the end, even though I knew what it was from, I read the citation as "Hank Williams Shakespeare."
Serves me right for scanning over it quickly.
Submitted by redskieslookfake (user info) at 2006-10-04 13:58:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Loved it.
Submitted by ColchesterDr (user info) at 2006-10-03 04:03:22 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by Bigmike (user info) at 2006-10-02 19:48:03 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by LeaderOfMen (user info) at 2006-09-27 22:29:29 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Too close for missiles, Im switching to guns.
Submitted by Amontillado (user info) at 2006-09-26 21:19:32 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Submitted by Merlina (user info) at 2006-09-25 09:33:06 (#)
Ranking: 2
Awesome.
Submitted by Bob_Dole (user info) at 2006-09-26 00:38:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Well played. Highly creative use of the title. I have an uphill battle ahead.
Submitted by forensicgirl3 (user info) at 2006-09-25 19:58:19 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
nice
Submitted by ubetidid (user info) at 2006-09-25 13:07:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
No Comment
Submitted by sicosemen (user info) at 2006-09-25 10:55:33 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I dug it.
Submitted by Phallic_Cymbals (user info) at 2006-09-25 10:37:48 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
im fuckin tanked mab
Submitted by inion_de_trua (user info) at 2006-09-25 10:11:51 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
i liked it. i was curious up until the end but that could be because i don't think too far ahead. something bugs me, but i can't figure out what so i won't knock anything off for it.
Submitted by apollo88 (user info) at 2006-09-25 09:59:14 EDT (#)
Ranking: 1
i dunno antius old chap this seems a bit 'antius by numbers' if you will.
for some reason it just didn't engage me as much as usual.
Submitted by HighVoltage900 (user info) at 2006-09-25 09:54:55 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Cool.
Submitted by icarus1987 (user info) at 2006-09-25 09:49:04 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Sharp! I like how you didn't feel the need to elaborate on what would have been useless details -- the name of the city, the cause of the destruction, the history, etc. Just kept to the critical details. I remember a Twilight Zone (or possibly Outer Limits) episode kind of like this, only the guy was selling memories instead of getting them, but honestly I liked this scenario better.
Submitted by Stagger_Lee (user info) at 2006-09-25 09:38:34 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Rock and/or roll, motherfucker.
Submitted by JoeyG (user info) at 2006-09-25 09:34:53 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Impressive stuff....much better than what I managed to pull off!!
Submitted by Merlina (user info) at 2006-09-25 09:33:06 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
Awesome.