Imperfect reflections within imperfect dreams (Finished)

[Danomel]

Black! It was as black as the predawn sky striped of stars. But a sky it was not. Smooth! As the finest glass polished to perfection by a master’s hand. Not an imperfection could be found. But glass it was not! Was he leaning against it or laying on it. At the moment, it did not seem to matter. Whatever it was, it was there close to Danomels eyes, his nose pressing against the cool surface, each breath causing momentary pools of whitish mist on the dark surface.

Light! To see there had to be light! Slowly he raised his hand, turning his head to the side. As his hand came into his field of vision, he realized he was lying face down. Putting both hands beneath himself, he pushed himself up.

Standing was not a problem. The black surface, whatever it was, was not slick. But the light was not constant. It was the sky! It seemed to be on fire. Memories were stirred of nights long ago and similar displays in the northern skies. Though never with this intensity, vividness, or range of colors. Like a great fire of unimaginable size, burning in across the sky.

Under the strange burning sky, for there was no sun, moon or stars, the ground was not black. Rather it was a deep dark blue like the darkest of sapphires, approaching black as one stared into its depths.

The plain seemed to stretch on for as far as Danomel could see. But upon turning around, some distance away, multiple structures of white rose above the endless plain. They being the only irregularity within sight, Danomel turned and took a step towards them.

There was no sense of movement, or at least none that he was familiar with. But his foot descended to a white crystalline beach and the structures where all around him. Looking around, there was the distinct impression of a great white land mass rising out of a midnight blue sea. Crystalline structures resembling trees and plants where visible at the edges of the white crystalline beach. Yet nothing moved. Everything was silent… except for a low crackling noise.

Up the white beach, in this fantastic landscape, there was something so ordinary that it was grossly out of place. A fire burned in a circle of rough gray rocks. Several rough hewn benches of wood flanked the ordinary looking fire at odd angles.

Walking towards the fire, he sat down on one of the benches. While it was nothing visible, there seemed to be a sense of waiting around the small camp fire.

[Danomel]

Suddenly he was there. Typical! Danomel had looked away for a mere moment, and it was that moment that the old man decided to appear. Could not possibly do it when Danomel was looking.

They sat their staring across the fire at each other for a flicker, then a few more. Let him speak first if he has something to say, Danomel thinks to himself as he stares at the old man, waiting.

"It doesn't matter you know," the old man says, "which one of us speaks first."

"What!?" The old mans words surprise Danomel. Can he read my thoughts?

"Of course I can read your thoughts!" The old man says with a laugh. After all, I am you, so to speak. And while this mode of communication is interesting, I think we really need to move our mouths, as we seem to have them here.

Danomel digests this information. "I seem to be a bit confused. How can you be me?"

"Well technically I guess you could say I am an aberration of your sub conscious mind. We should be smart enough to realize that all this does not exist in what we colloquially refer to as the real world." the strange old man replies. "So you have several possibilities to choose from. Either you are asleep or unconscious and this is all a dream - or nightmare if you like, or you are totally delusional - which would not bode well for our future, or you are dead - in which case this is all irrelevant. Your choice here."

[Danomel]

Danomel turns his attention to the fire. Strange how the wood does not seem to be consumed.

With a sigh of frustration, Danomels responds; “An interesting set of choices you give me, dead or delusional. I’m not sure I like either one.”

“Well there are a couple of other choices, but I did not mention them, as you will either reject one out of hand or accept the other which would probably defeat any benefits this meeting might provide me, and you by association.” The old man responded.

“I would guess one is that you are not who you claim to be.” Danomel spoke slowly and thoughtfully. “In which case it would be prudent to mistrust your motivations. However I am at a loss for any other choices.”

The old man obviously found something very funny about Danomels last remarks as his laughter continued for some time. “The last choice is that I am exactly who I said I am. This is not reality as you know it. So any assumptions about such things as ‘time’ in this place are purely arbitrary.”

[Danomel]

Danomel was attempting to deal with the ramifications of the possibility of his future self's presence, real or imagined (though the distinction as applied to a dream was probably somewhat irrelevant). However, before he could really wrap his mind around the concept, an additional rude surprise came into play. At some point another individual had joined him and his future self at the small fire. But Danomel was unable to determine when or how he had shown up.

What was really confusing was this new individual was obviously an older version of himself, yet somewhat younger than the first. And to further confuse the issue, this other version was wearing chain mail and had a rather nasty looking axe that had obviously seen much unpleasant use.

The two alternate versions of himself eyed each other with obviously unfriendly glares. The first seemed surprised that the second was there, while the second just seemed angry. Danomel had the distinct impression that a fight was about to break out between himself, or selves, if that were even possible?

It was a good thing this was a dream, Danomel thought to himself as he felt swept up by a helpless confusion. Even for a dream, this is getting ridiculous, how do I wake myself up?

The fight never had a chance to start. Instead, and this time Danomel saw it, another version of himself, this one about the same age, shimmered in producing a myriad of rainbow effects. This new version was dressed in what appeared to be some sort of fabric woven from very fine stands of metal. There was also some sort of armor piece covering his left forearm that was bejeweled with strange square multicolored stones of some sort. The newer version of himself pressed several of the mounted stones, and the previous two versions faded out of existence.

Since this newer version seemed to be about his own age, Danomel had decided that this was all some raving fantasy, rather than visits from his future self's. He must have caught a fever someplace, and this was just a delusional fever dream.

"It is probably better if you continue to believe that" his remaining alternate self said, as if reading his mind, similar to the first alternate self. "Just call me Dan, so as to avoid all this alternate self confusion you seem to be inflicting on yourself."

Dan took a seat on the opposite side of the fire. "Don't worry, you will probably have a splitting headache in the morning, but you will remember virtually none of this. Sort of like trying to put five gallons of paint into a one gallon can. It is not going to fit and the strain on the one gallon can will be enormous. "

Danomel vacantly stares at this latest apparition across the fire. "Huh? ahh... ?"

Dan seems to find this statement funny, and replies between laughs. "Don't worry, I am not one of your future self's like the other two. I'm more like an alternate self of you here and now. For some reason, your future selves are trying to manipulate your current life, though the objectives are somewhat unclear to me at this point. However their actions where putting a sever strain on the probability matrix of your horn, to the point of rupturing it and affecting the rest of the multiverse. I felt obliged to cross over at this point to put a stop to it before the Reality Rangers or the Probability Police got involved and really muck things up. I guess you could say we are at crossed horns."

"Huh? What horn?" Danomel seemed to be just full of intelligent responses lately. And Dan was starting to remind him of a hawker in the market because he was talking very fast and not making much sense.

Dan sighs. "let me see if I can explain this. Your existence can be summed up in a artificial construct often referred to by some as Gabriel's Horn. It has a finite volume, yourself. And infinite surface area, representing every event you ever experienced with multiple outcomes, which do exist in parallel with each other. Now my existence came into being from a convergence of the horns represented by your parents, however, it was a different convergence from the one you came from. So I am not a future self, but more like a parallel self. In this case our two horns have crossed, preventing your future selves form modifying your own horn."

With a sympathetic look, Dan realizes that he is confusing Danomel even more. "Don't worry about it, you will be waking up in a, uh what do you call it, yes a burn. That's it. And this will all be just a vague dream."