Every night I travel to a different world. Once in it, I can't tell what's real or what isn't. Until I wake up, I have to live a different life. Same people yet different. Same places yet not the same. Things make sense but they don't as well. This is what a dream is like.
Dream is a very exciting experience. Isn't it amazing that everyday you could just run away from your cruel boss, arrogant teachers and despicable acquaintances? In a way, each one of you possesses this amazing capability to be in an alternate reality. A reality where YOU are incharge.
Also reality is a dubious concept. How do you define it? What is real and what isn't? Is your reality any more real than mine? A classical example is a pet goldfish in a bowl. Let's say you are in your home and own a pet goldfish. You're, let's say, staring at a pencil. For you it's a straight wooden object used to write. Now the same object, is being observed by the goldfish. Owing to the glass bowl, the goldfish would see a curved object. But can you say that what goldfish is observing isn't totally real? If during the course of these 4.5 billion years, the atmosphere was constituted of some highly dense gas, the same pencil would have been percieved in a different way. In that case, this new perception would have been regarded as the "reality". Thus we can safely say now that there is no objective definition of reality. Different set of conditions, different reality. And this is just regarding the visual perception of reality not the cognitive.
Now coming back to the initial talk, every night I enter a world where the meaning of reality is different. The rules of this world are different as well. For me it's an exit from the periodic hardships.
Once you enter this Dreamland, huge changes occur. Events of this world don't cause physical pain. If something happens, you can feel the misery but not the pain. You can see your reflection suffering but still won't feel the pain.
My personal observation is that mostly what we see in dreams is taking every element (people, places, events, emotions etc) and mixing it randomly. Like putting them in a juice mixer. The dream you'd probably see is a jumbled mixture of everything. The shopkeeper who might have caught your sight would be a partner of yours in a robbery done by you in the other world.
These days I have developed a special fondness for dreams. I spend more time there than I should. Why shouldn't I? It was the perfect exit. Everything I couldn't achieve in the real world, I could in dreams. Someday I'd find myself as a detective chasing the most hideous people that exist. Other day, I could see myself working for NASA with nobody to laugh at this thought. I don't check my wallet here. What I want is mine. This was such a paradise. Everything was perfect with my nocturnal fantasies. Yet I wanted more. I wanted all this. Not just as a feeling. I wanted to actually live it and never snap out of it.
Many days back something happened. A batchmate of mine hit me. I don't have a strout build to be able to respond. However, the build can't stop a person from cursing. But that was all I could do. A sudden saddening realisation took over me. This helplessness was debilitating. Then it struck me. I have known the solution all along. My drug, dreams! It's all about feeling good about it, right? Why do people fight? Because they can't subside that feeling of offence or revenge inside them? All that is needed to subside that feeling is to increase the levels of seretonin and dopamine. Booyah, you're content and jolly again. "So that's what I'll do. Sleep and rectify my hormone levels. Maybe some cool dream will help it."
That night's dream was such a relief. I was a boxer in that dream, though a struggling one. However the relieving event was that person's accident. Sounds cruel, felt good. The next day I could see people gossip all around. On inquisition, it turned out that particular person suffered the same fate. Despite my internal elation, it was a shocking news.
"Could it be...? Nah. This doesn't happen. ", I muttered to myself while I was trying to sleep that night. The next day when I woke up, I tried really hard to remember what I saw. What I remembered wasn't something that I'd want to happen. Nishkarsh (my friend) killed a shopkeeper. That shopkeeper isn't someone whom people would like but to get murdered is off limits. I freshened up, rushed myself into my clothes, ran to the class. No one was discussing any local news. To my relief no such incident had happened. "Yes. Exactly. It isn't logical. "
That day I and my friends went out for a stroll. There's a cool place to hang out in Saifai, the Clock Tower. The guards didn't allow us. "Sorry, but you people will have to return. Someone has been murdered. I can't allow you. ", one of them said. I was afraid now. "Wh...Who?" "The owner of that general store. Those goons shot him and ran away! Bastards!" I trembled with fear. Nishkarsh didn't kill him but the same man is dead on the same day! How could this be happening? I had no clue. It could have been ignored once but two times is a statistically significant figure.
If I connect the dots, I had certain grudge against both that shopkeeper and batchmate. Both suffered the same fate. However, how that person came to the fate wasn't similar. Also, I can't make out the time for that event to happen but it happened on the same day.
This was scary. But I didn't have one feeling about it. Yes I was shook to my roots. But the other half; it saw an amazing opportunity. The opportunity for which I had always longed for. My life won't be mundane any more. Such power. Yes, not as precise as the one Light Yagami gets in Death Note, but still it was something that no one had ever possessed. Finally the power to take revenge.
So I sat down, took out a notebook and started writing names of everyone. Everyone I had ever hated. Anyone who had ever laughed at me or my ambitions. Anyone who I thought shouldn't exist. People so dumb who don't realise that all that matters is scientific advancement. And thus, thereonwanrds, began the purge.
Days passed. I dreamt about their deaths and woke. Everyday I'd read about someone's demise. Many times I'd get to know about them through the gossips. Sometimes the events happened infront me. With every event that got completed, I'd cut off that jotted down name and smirk. Justice was served. "Oh human, had you not been so inconsiderate about your behavior and how your thought processes hampered the collective advancement towards a scientific society, you might have survived. "
These many deaths don't go unnoticed. Very soon this created a huge buzz. The media went berserk. Experts were vexed. "Why such huge spike in mortality in certain places?" Nothing would seem to connect. But there wasn't any way they could connect back to me? Was there?
Every day I'd try to figure out why this was happening. Why me? For reasons unknown, my two realities were merging. This initially didn't pose any problem. Later on though, it was getting difficult for me. It was getting difficult to tell which was my reality? The reality to which I actually belonged to. The dreams were getting more vivid every day. Good thing was I could control what I did in the dream. So I had to adapt to this. One of my methods was to inflict physical injury on myself. Injury doesn't hurt in dreams. However, if the injury was deep/severe enough, I'd snap out of the dream(without pain ). This really helped me maneuver how I wanted my dreams to go on.
It's been a month since. Things were again getting back on track. Infact, the to-kill list of people was getting short of names. I had developed a taste for this. I needed more of this. Other activities were nothing compared to this. That adrenaline rush to get something become a reality. Gosh!
That day in college I find Prabhanshu with Nishkarsh hanging out in the complex. Lately I and Prabhanshu have not been spending much time together (he's my best friend). Rather he is the one who is not. They even sit together in class. This was too much. How could he possibly do that to me? It's a pity, they don't realize what I am now. Not that usual miserable creature.
Today as I lie down to sleep, and record this in my Samsung Notes, I'll have to express my condolences for you Nishkarsh. This is the first time I'll be killing a friend. You should not have done this.
Shit. It's 9:20 am in the morning. What did I just see? Oh no. Prabhanshu will be dead today. Oh no! How could this happen? This could only happen if I had a greater grudge against you, Prabhanshu! Why should that to be? Answer me, my consciousness, why? Because supposedly he betrayed me? Oh dear. I have to save him. I can't allow this to happen.
It's 10:15 am. I have finally managed to find Prabhanshu. He is near the clock tower. He cannot see me, I am far away. I don't know when or how it'll happen but it will.
It's 10 :20 am now. Nothing unusual. He's chilling out, listening to music on his skull candy. Wait! I see something. There's this grim looking man advancing towards him. Oh dear, he has a gun. A GUN! Oh dammit!
10:33 am : I've shot myself in the abdomen. I'll die very soon. I ran after that guy. But that person shot Prab. He freaking killed him just because of me. I could not accept that Prabhanshu can be killed. Maybe this is a dream. All of this is just a very bad dream. I'll wake up and everything will be fine. I'll be able to be with everyone. All those nice people. So I killed the person and shot myself so that I could snap out of it. This hurts. This is not a dream. Oh dear it hurts so much. Ahhhhh! This should not have happened. I'm covered in my own bood, Prab isn't responding. This agony is unbearable.
In my final moments, I should complete this story and put it on fb so that people can know about it after my death. I had the power that no one else possessed but it backfired. I let a different reality devour me. This is what happens. I wish I could reverse everything. Go back in time, right my wrongs. My hands are shaking. Oh, this is the end. Is this justice that was served?
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