I had a very interesting dream last night. And in true Rachel-dream fashion, it was quite cinematic. So I wrote it all out. Maybe I'll analyze it. Maybe you will. Or just sit back and enjoy.


I'm in the woods, in the mountains. Everything is green, alive and beautiful. So misleading. There are six of us here. Not camping for the weekend. Trying to survive. Running from the dead, who are chasing us. Up here in the mountains I smell the grass and the pine and the running water in the creek. Back in the city, where we were for a while, all I could smell was the rotting bodies as they moved around outside of our little fortress in the basement of the department store.

I grab an empty bucket, the cracked one I can't haul water in, and my axe. We have several pistols and rifles, but we're saving them. It's hard to get ammo up here. And if the dead make it up here, last thing we want is for more to come at the sound of gunshots. I find a small, thin stick and twist it in my hair to put it up in a bun on the back of my head.

"Shane, I'm going to the creek." I call out.

"Not alone," he calls back, coming up next to me with a baseball bat in his hand. "I can find some more flat rocks anyway."

We begin walking. "Smartest idea yet, heating them in the fire and putting them in our blankets at night to keep us warm."

"I'll keep you warm, Rachel."

We smile and make our way to the creek. Once there, I set the bucket down and look into the water. "I see a few fish in my net!" I reach in and grab the string I rigged to pull the net closed before I pull it out of the water. I drag the entire thing up to reveal several trout. "Enough to feed us for at least a few nights!"

"Shhh..." Shane hushes me, grabbing his bat. I see him walk gently a few feet away from me before turning around. "RUN! AWAY FROM CAMP!"

I drop the next back in the water, pick up my axe and run. I jump over tree trunks and dodge branches, smelling that familiar rotten stench. It burns my eyes as it gets closer, but I keep running. I don't hear Shane behind me anymore, but I can hear a grunt and the contact of his bat with the skull of a Dead. I keep running. I know this hill well enough that I could get back to camp after the Dead are killed and gone. That's the rule, run away from camp so we don't drag the Dead straight to the others.

I trip over a tree trunk and fall to the ground with a thud. Then I smell it. I roll over to see a Dead standing over me, screaming. It's breath is the worst part. I swing my bat and close my eyes, feeling the spatter of black blood hit my face. I get up and pummel it's skull in with a few more hits. That's when I see Shane running towards me. "BEHIND YOU!"

I spin around and hit another Dead, nearly decapitating it with blows by the time Shane reaches my side. He takes me in his arms. "Four of them. How the fuck did they get up this far?"

"What if there was a cabin or something not too far away?"

"It's getting dark, we can't leave the mountain now. We have to fortify camp for the night. Come on. I found some bathroom stall walls a few dozen feet back, we can carry them back to camp."

We begin to slowly walk back to camp, stopping occasionally. It's tiring, killing a Dead and lugging metal partitions with you. We get back to the river and grab the fish before going back to camp.

My father and grandpa are getting the fire started. There is a few others. We tell them what happened and hand my father the fish to cook. Shane, grandpa and myself get to work using the bathroom walls to create a safe 'box' for us to sleep in, so we are prepared. Grandpa is a good shot, but he's old, so he does best in a 'blind.' He can snipe a Dead like nobody's business.

We get the fire low, having finished our work and our fish, and it starts to get cold. Dad and one other guy decide to take the first watch. With grandpa and the few others fast asleep, Shane and I crawl into a makeshift sleeping bag on the far end of the 'blind' and snuggle close together.

"We're not gonna make it."

"We will. We'll find it. Don't worry."

"Find what? My grandpa is old, he doesn't know shit."

"Rachel, it's okay." Shane kisses me. "It may not be real, but it's the only option we have anymore."

I wake up to gunshots. Shane and I scramble out of bed to see my father shooting a rifle towards the woods. "DEAD EVERYWHERE WE ARE SURROUNDED!"

Tucking my bat in the loop of my pants I sewed in for the purpose, I grab my two pistols and step out of the blind. I see the Dead and start shooting, killing one per bullet. I shoot several, then I run out of bullets. Tucking my guns in my waistband I take out my bat and start swinging.

Suddenly a woman's voice comes on the ham radio near the fire. "SHANE the army is coming, they are gonna nuke the whole mountain!"

Shane turns around and answers the radio call. "LAURA! WHY?"

"The mountains are full of the dead. They left the cities."

"THERE IS NO BOMB SHELTER!" I yell, killing another Dead. "There never was."

"THERE IS!" I hear grandpa yell from the blind, over the sound of the melee. "Down the hill!"

"Dad?" I turn around.

"Grab everyone, let's go!"

I take a woman's hand, and turn and run. There's a dirt path along the edge of the rock outcropping of the mountain, one that looks worn. Shane, Dad, Grandpa and another man (nameless/faceless in my dream) are following. Then I come face to face with a Dead. "NO!" I scream, hitting it with my bat.

But not before it bites the woman. I hear a gunshot, Shane takes her out. I turn back around to see several Dead tearing my father apart. Shane looks at me. "Close your eyes," he warns.

I hear a gunshot.

"GO GO GO!" Grandpa screams. "Just down there!"

The four of us left run to a small metal hatch. Grandpa opens it as the Dead keep running towards us. They are too close, Shane and I are beating them with bats and axes. Once the hatch is open we all crawl in, having to slam the door shut and lock it.

Once inside, it's a utopia. A full mini-bar. Independent air, water, plumbing, a food for ten for a year. I start exploring. There's battery power, self-sustaining generators, everything. There are board games and books and everything. There are bunks for ten people, and a chemical shower.

"Fucking shit," I gasp, picking up a book.

That's when I heard the BOOM of the atomic bomb. The shelter vibrates. Then I remember my father is dead. "Shane..."

Shane comes and holds me. "It's gonna be okay. Come on, let's get you cleaned up."

I look down to see we are both covered in blood. It smells like rot.


This is where I'm gonna stop my dream, because it gets a little 'sexy' before I woke up this morning. In my dream, I could smell rot so distinctly. It was wierd. Maybe someday I'll write up my lion attack dream. It's an ongoing-series, about once a year since I was about 12 I had dreams about lion attacks and hiding, and the next dream would pick up where the last one left off...it was strange. Anyway...anyone wanna analyze this????