Briana Bolger 8/9/25 Briana Bolger 8/9/25

Gorilla? I don’t even know her.

Meet the basic dreams division, the team that creates the dreams that people aren’t really meant to remember.

“OMG, you would not believe this dream I had last night.”

Steve reached across the table for the creamer, letting out a deep sigh, shaking his head. “It was fucking bananas…” His face stays the same, as the room around him changes. No longer a diner, but a dark alley. THE Dark Alley, the stereotypical one we’ve all seen a million times on TV.

“So I’m in this alley behind…” he looks around “um, like…I don’t know. Maybe behind the Lincoln Tap Room or something.” He shrugs and continues. “And it doesn’t feel exactly right, so I’m already on guard. Then, I hear this low growl. And I look down towards the street, but instead of like, empty boxes and stuff by the dumpsters, there are a bunch notebooks. All stacked up.”

“Like Macbooks?” a disembodied voice says.

Steve looks annoyed. The alley is gone, we’re back in the diner. He looks across at Pedro, the question still sitting on his face. “No, man, like NOTEBOOK notebooks. Like the kind you write shit down in when you know…like old school shit. Paper.” Pedro nods, and we get a half-hearted “oh, crazy” from the third person at the table, Melanie, while she scans the menu.

Steve pours the creamer into his coffee. With a mumbled “anyway…” we’re back in the alley. Steve looks up, and around and then squints at something in the distance. “and then I see this….something…something big…coming down the alley, moving towards me. It’s not moving fast, exactly. More kind of deliberate and steady.” He’s still looking calm, but he starts backing away slowly.

“Then all of the sudden it’s RIGHT UP IN MY FACE.”

BOOM up pops a big dark mass right next to him. The shape moves from blurry to sharp focus. Steve stand there, narrating. “It’s a giant fucking gorilla man, just right there in front of me. We’re like nose to nose at this point and I’m scared, but I’m like…also a bit curious. Like what the fuck is actually happening with this gorilla all up in my business?”

The Gorilla lets out a breath through its nose and without breaking eye contact, pushes something towards Steve. Steve unconsciously grabs this blurry shape, without realizing its weight as The Gorilla lets go. He bends slightly, looking down.

“And then he hands me this…like typewriter, man.”

“A what now?” and we’re back in the diner.

Steve stops, sighs, and takes a sip of coffee. “A typewriter. It’s like the shit you used to do computer stuff before there were computers. It’s like…for secretaries and stuff? My grandma still has one in her house and…I actually think this was that one, this was exactly my grandma’s typewriter!” Melanie doesn’t look up from her phone while she monotones “woah, insane.”

“Anyway” woosh, we’re back in the alley.

Steve is holding the typewriter which has now changed into a sharper image of a perfect, lovely old typewriter in a sky blue colour. He looks down at it, then back to the Gorilla. And he says, “what am I supposed to do with this?” The Gorilla looks at him, its expression growing slightly more threatening as he raises his arm. Steve winces a bit, not backing away, not exactly. As the Gorilla raises its arm, and simply points.

He follows with his eyes and sees a doorway open up in the back of the building. “There 1 million percent was not a doorway there a second ago. And not only there, it’s like..GLOWING. I mean, whatever is in there is glowing. So now I’m curious, right? So I go”

Passing The Gorilla, Steve keeps eye contact just until he’s a few steps away and then the turns to face the door he’s walking towards “and as I get closer, I realise that it’s kind of a big room, and there are a bunch of people in there, all sitting at desks and all of them have typewriters.” Steve walks into the room. There have got to be almost a hundred people in there, all clacking away at different versions of typewriters. Some are smiling and typing quickly, confidently, the look of someone who has something to say and can’t wait to get it out. Others are pecking at keys, unsure how to actually use this machine, or maybe just unsure of their own story.

“And then I see that there is one desk free. And it’s…” he pauses, looking around the room. “I just UNDERSTAND that I need to go there. That it’s MY desk.” And I’m like… ok, I guess this is my life now.” Steve moves to the desk, puts his typewriter down and takes a seat. “So I sit down, and the thing is all set up in front of me, paper is in it, light is on, which… I mean, I guess that means it’s working and stuff. But like… what am I supposed to DO, man?

So I look up, and The Gorilla is standing right in front of my desk now, and it looks like, kind of happier? Like not angry for sure. So I just decide that I guess I should ask it. So I say ‘um. Ok, what am I supposed to do now?”

The Gorilla’s face moves closer and pretty soon it’s all Steve can see. The face of The Gorilla. No longer threatening, in fact, it looks like it’s on the verge of laughter.

“And then this motherfucker says “Human type story. Type until masterpiece”

The voice changes to a woman’s voice, struggling to contain laughter “Human make Gorilla Shakespeare!”

With those words, the room melts away, The Gorilla changes shape, and a woman who’s probably in her late 20s, long messy box dyed red hair, wearing a pair of turquoise blue coveralls takes its place, and she’s expectantly looking around, eyes wet with tears. There is no more Steve, no more Gorilla, just this woman, Bea, sitting around a table in what looks like a break room, a story. And they are, thankfully, for the most part, laughing.

“You did not” says one of them, shaking his head with a smile “what were you expecting?”

“I absolutely did” Bea holds up the fuzzy mass in her hand, which, now that we’re really looking at it, focusing on it… we realize it’s a gorilla mask, and a really bad one. Its fur is matted, eye holes too big, and you can tell how it smells just by looking at it. “and I don’t know, I guess I was just thinking ‘why do we have to do all the work, like let them come up with a storyline or two since we’re there, right?”

Bharat, still shaking his head a bit, clapped her on the back. “ok, that’s fair. Did you see any of what The Dreamer was writing?”

Nash looked up from what she was tinkering with in her lap. She’d been sort of half paying attention, but now, she was focused. Coming up with the storyline was the part she hated the most. Props was where she shined.

“No, I mean, kind of, it looked mostly like some sort of typical unconscious wish-fulfillment sort of deal, like “once upon a time there was a guy and all his friends thought he was the best”. Nothing usable.” She looked over at Nash. “but, I’m still pretty good at coming up with bullshit, so we can brainstorm some stuff for your next show. When is it?”

Nash looked at the old digital clock on the wall. It was right under a faded printout with If you have time to lean, you have time to dream along with some obvious clip art of a duck and some sparkles on it. “In about 10 minutes, and I’m a little stuck. Here’s the briefing.” She hands Bea a printout on green and white striped paper:

“Omg, Nash, you’ve got this” Bea said, handing the briefing back. “So you’re in the grocery store, right, obviously because” she waves her hands around. “And so you just have the flamingo come up and go “excuse me, did you see there’s a sale on hummus? But you know in like a super sexy way so that The Dreamer is all like… oh, really? For meeeee?”

She holds her hands over her chest, bowing her head looking a little fake embarrassed.

“Then from there, easy peasy. The math teacher is doing an interpretive dance that The Dreamer understands as ‘Your new love interest is super into you because even though you sucked at math, you got that A’ and then he dances away, The Dreamer is all ‘oh yeah I did’ and then the flamingo comes back and is like ‘excuse me, did you check your mail? You can’t leave unless you got that coupon’ and The Dreamer is going to be like…’ok do I really need that hummus that badly?’ and then The Flamingo drops it: ‘Your new love interest really wants that hummus.’ Annnd…dream!”

Bea extends her arms in a “taaaadaaaa” flourish.

Nash sits there thinking, looking down at what she’s been tinkering with. It’s a few pink pipe cleaners and some pink feathers that looks way more like a flamingo than it has any business looking like. She really is good at props. She picks up the brief, looks at it again. “ok, but what about the ending? It seems like everything is kind of tidy here, no loose ends.”

Bea leans over the table, grinning. “No, that’s the best part, because The Dreamer is going to be like ‘I don’t really want the hummus’ because they really don’t want to open their mail, and let’s be real, like 95 percent of time waking tech doesn’t work over here anyway, so they’ll be all “wait, do I really even want hummus that badly? Or do I just want to get laid?”

”Plus, when they wake up whatever they remember they’ll just be like…oh yeah. totally hummus induced.” Bharat smiled. “It’s a solid plan.”

Nash started to slowly smile and nod. “yeah, Bea, that’s good. I like that.” She took out a pen and wrote “hummus coupon” on a post-it note, and stuck it on the Flamingo. She picked up a Darth Vader action figure with a post-it saying “your math teacher” on it, and headed towards the door. “Thank you! I’m going to grab the grocery store backdrop and head to the stage. See you later!”

Bea flipped her a little jaunty salute, then looked over at Bahrat, Josie and Ted, the remainder of her shift-mates. “Ok then, I guess, back to work” she said slapping her hands on her knees and getting up from the table. Ted looked at her, mildly annoyed “yay, work, work is fun, it’s so so great” he said, also getting up, as the printer starts buzzing. Bea didn’t even look back at him as she walked over to the printer, ripped off the briefing, glanced at it with a smile and then headed out to the prop room. “best job in the world” she said happily as the door closed behind her.

“Honestly” Ted said, rolling his eyes. “It’s not like we’re making art here. It’s not like we’re in Lucid or Prophetic or even fucking fate-adjacent. The BDD is lame, and I do not get her “go get ‘em tiger!” attitude.

“My guy” Josie said, pointing a perfectly manicured nail at him “first off, Lucid is a total shit show. The Dreamers are like, fighthing you half the time, and sometimes they REALLY see you and they fuck with your work and even completely take over sometimes. Like, you think our dreamers are bad? There is no sayin no to a dreamer who goes fully lucid. They take over, your vision is out the window, boom, done gone. No thank you.”

She took off a couple of beautiful bangles from her perfectly-tanned-but-not-too-tanned wrist as she continued “and honestly, being an oracle must be pretty creepy. I mean, who wants to know half of that stuff, and then your Dreamer is probably just screaming the whole time anyway.”

Wrinkling up her nose and pushing a lock of pure black hair out of her face, she shook her head back and forth. “Uh-uh. No thank you very much. Basic Dream Division really is pretty close to perfect, it’s like all the nocturnal narrative, none of the drama.” The printer started buzzing again, and she walked over to it, tore off a brief, gave it a glance and breezed out the door, tucking her bangles into her overalls.

Bahrat looked over at Ted “She’s right, I worked in Lucid ops for like a minute. It was awful. I think the only way you can really do that is if you just don’t really care about what goes through.”

“I mean, I get that. Maybe Lucid was a bad example, but like I mean even the ADT has to be more interesting than this.” Ted said, pointedly looking over at the printer that had printed out another briefing. Pointedly not picking it up. “Who really cares about these run-of-the-mill basics. Like, we’re not changing lives, we’re not making an actual difference. It’s just…” He sighed, got up and walked over to the printer. Tore off the assignment and looked at it. Sighed. “it’s just noise” he said dejectedly as he walked out the door.

“NO NO NO NO NO” Bahrat was staring at Ted, looking horrified, while Josie just kind of rolled her eyes. Nash, as usual was using tweezers to perfectly place rhinestones on a greeting card so that it reads I’m always ok, you’re never ok. The smiley face in glitter glue was already in place.

Bea was shaking her head back and forth, hands over her mouth until they could no longer hold back her words. “COME ON” she yelled throwing those same hands up in the air. “It literally says AVOID SQUIRRELS. Not ‘Make the childhood friend an orange squirrel that keeps asking why it’s orange. I know you’re new, but I assume you do know how to read?” She was now fully up in Ted’s face. But he wasn’t meeting her gaze. He was just sanding there, clutching a big orange stuffed squirrell in his fist, windchimes entangled in it’s tail.

“Yes, I know how to read, but I didn’t really think..”

“Dream logic 101!” She interuped “ if you let The Dreamer add anything, they will always, ALWAYS go off brief. “ She stopped, looked at Ted for a second. Her face softened and she reached for the squirrel in his tightly clenched fist. As she pulled it up, he realized how hard he was holding onto to it, and slightly embarrased, he let it go, the windchimes clanging out a sad melody as they bumped into each other and then the floor, falling free of the squirrel’s tail at last.

“Look” Bea said, smiling softly “I’m sorry, I was kind of out of line there. I’m not your boss or anything, so I’m not sure why I’m giving you lectures. I just…” her brow furrowed a little bit before she continued. “I just hate to see anyone on the team not having a good time with this.” she looked around the break room, her gaze lingered for a beat on a sign on the fridge that says It’s always sleep o’clock somewhere with that familiar terrible clip art of a sleeping person, full on Zzzzz coming out of their mouth, disembodied arms holding two puppets in front of their closed eyes.

“This thing is kind of special, and I mean, it’s easy, and it’s fun.” She shrugged. “At least, it’s the best gig I’ve ever had”. As the printer started to buzz, she moved towards it, pulled off the brief and had a look.

“I mean, where else would I get to pretend to be a tiger in fucking OUTER SPACE? FedEx/Kinkos? Taco Bell/KFC? How about No/Where? So maybe think about the weird, wonderful kind of work you’re doing or you know, CAN do and just lean into it and try to have the tiniest bit of actual fun.” She opened the fridge and grabbed a jar of pickles, started to close the door but opened it up again and grabbed an egg, kicking the door closed behind her as she turned around and walked out the door with the squirrel and windchimes tucked neeatly under her arm.

Ted sighed, and went and sat down at the table next to Nash. “How long have you been doing this, Nash?” He asked as she placed her final stone, then went back and fussed with it until it was perfectly aligned.

Her brow furrowed a bit, but she didn’t look up from her work as she answerd “um…I don’t know. I mean…time you know? It’s whatever”. Josie nodded as she flipped through a magazine, Ted was able to make out a fish jumping over a carton of milk on one page and someone holding up three fingers and a triangle with the word VERB on another. “Yeah, Ted, I mean, that’s kind of a dumb question, no offence.” The printer started going off and Josie stood up, paused before tearing off the brief and turned to Ted “do you want to take this one? You know, get back up on the horse or whatever?”

He thought for a beat, and then nodded. “Yeah, ok, fine. I’m going to get fucking excited about whatever is on that page and give someone the best damn dream of their life!” as he walked to the printer, and tore off the briefing with gusto.

Ted was sitting back at the table, laughing. All eyes were on him - even Nash was smiling and paying attention. Baraht was looking at him, almost painfully hanging on every word. “Come on, wait. The snack was…”

“The goat was the snack!” Ted burst out, excitedly. “I mean, not really, but the goat walked The Dreamer through making cheese FROM HIMSELF and then handed The Dreamer crackers and only then The Dreamer was like…wait, this is why that letter said I should save room for company, right? NOW I FUCKING GET IT!”

“Wow, Ted, I’m impressed” Bea said, clapping him on the back. “That is some next level work, I bet that’s going to have a fucking fantasitc retention. More of a hard land than a soft splash for sure.”

“I mean, it actually was kind of fun. I need to get back to set, though, I left the hallway on stage. It’s a pain in the ass to put up and break down, so…kind of hoping someone wants to use it?” He looked around hopefully.

“Oh, absolutely, that’s perfect for me” Josie stood up “I can use that and tag it with “your high school” on a stickie for my next gig” She picked up the wind up godzilla and sparklers, giving a quick peace sign on her way out.

The printer went off again, Bahrat stood up, walked over and pulled it off, not even glancing at what was on it as he headed towards the door and the prop room beyond. “Really nice work, Ted, I mean, we know that recall rate isn’t everything, I mean, this isn’t night terrors, but I do think that The Dreamer is going to be telling people about that one for a while.”

As soon as the door closed, Bea stood up, streched and looked at Ted. She walked straight past a punch clock with cards that said “IN” with everyone’s name, as well as a few other names. Zoren. Not Kevin. Victoria. Casper. Mouse. And one simply labled ?xx. “Want to go grab a snack at the bar? It’s on me, for being such a bitch earlier”.

“Sure, I’d like that” Ted got up and walked towards the door. “But I mean, there’s a vending machine right down the hall..”

“Oh Ted, no.” Bea opens up the door for Ted and he walkes on through “That’s only for the ADD, it’s like…bugs and baby birds and things for the animal dreams. If you ate something out of that, please don’t tell me about it, I’ll hurl”

The door closes behind them, and the sound of their banter fades, and the printer popping on fills the silence of the break room.

Briana Bolger 8/9/25 Briana Bolger 8/9/25

Meow, that hurts

A dream goes off the rails when Bea loses control

Bea was excited. Like, excited excited, not her normal level of glee. Josie and Nesh looked at each other; Josie raised an eyebrow, Nesh shrugged in response, a half-smile on her lips.

"Okay, I have my staircase," she said, holding up a piece of cardboard folded to look like stairs. A post-it note on the top had two words: spiral and luxurious. A random wire dangled from the bottom. "And check this out." She paused, made sure everyone was paying attention, and then… button press!

The staircase lit up with tiny LED lights blinking erratically. "Oh, wait." She pressed the button again. Now they blinked more slowly. Press. Solid light. Sigh. Press again. A soft glow appeared, growing brighter, fading, then returning to that soft glow.

"Huh?" she said proudly, one hand pointing to her cardboard masterpiece. "Right?"

Silence. Blank looks.

Ted leaned across the table, squinting. "I mean, it’s nice, don’t get me wrong, but… I guess I don’t get it?"

Bea sighed. "Okay, hold on."

She grabbed more things from her bag and plopped them onto the table. A small rectangular mirror with a post-it that read your mother. Five small dolls, four with tape over their mouths. And a door lovingly crafted out of construction paper, bearing the words so small and you know you want to, with an arrow pointing to a drawn-on doorknob.

She looked expectantly at the group. Nothing.

"It’s really nice," Nesh said, finally breaking the silence.

"It’s not nice, it’s epic!" Bea barked, clearly frustrated. She pulled out her final piece: an old cassette player. She hit play and dared them not to love it.

A few chords. Then someone softly singing:

Thank you for coming home
Sorry that the chairs are all worn
I left them here, I could have sworn...

Josie’s eyes lit up. "Oh, I know this! It’s… um…"

These are my salad days
Slowly being eaten away
Just another play for today
Oh but I’m proud of you…

Ted hummed along. "Wait, I think I love this song. What is it again?"

"Exactly," Bea said, abruptly slamming the stop button. With a satisfied grin, she stood. "They’ll be like, ‘I know this, but from where?’ All day. It’s going to haunt them."

She confidently scooped up her props, carefully tucking them back into her bag. "The Dreamer is in for a fucking TREAT."

Bahrat watched her pack up. "Okay, but… let me see that brief." He held out his hand.

Bea handed him the paper on the table, wrapping the staircase wire around her hand to avoid tangling.

"Okay, yeah, I see it. But I guess I’m missing the storyline. What are you planning on having the voice say? That seems kind of important."

Bea grabbed the brief back with one hand, gesturing with the other and her light-up staircase.

"I’m going to play it by ear. See what The Dreamer brings up and riff off that. I’ve done it a thousand times. No worries." She smiled. "Okay, disbelievers, see you after the show. Can’t wait to tell you all about it."

Josie called after her, "Hey, can I get that tape when you’re done?" But Bea was already out the door. Josie shrugged and went back to her magazine.

Bea was sitting in the break room. And she was in a mood. Ted and Josie walked in, laughing.

Ted said, "I mean, the teeth thing is so overdone, but you made it feel fresh. That’s amazing."

Josie smiled but brushed it off. "It just kind of came to me. But I’m pretty sure the recall on that one is going to hit."

They felt Bea before they saw her. The emotional weather in the room was thick, heavy.

"Hey…..Bea, how did that staircase-mirror show go?" Ted asked. "I bet the multiple-voice one-mouth thing killed."

Bea didn’t look up from her Oodles of Noodles cup, stirring morosely. "Yeah, it was fine, I guess." She stabbed a rehydrated pea and brought it sadly to her mouth.

Josie and Ted looked at each other. Ted gave Josie the your turn look. Josie scrunched her face briefly, then recovered.

"Um, so… fine is fine, right? Do you want… to… I don’t know… taaaaalk about it or something?"

Bea stabbed her fork back into the noodles. Heavy sigh.

Ted, now genuinely concerned, sat down next to her. "Hey," he said kindly. "What happened?"

Bea looked up, shoulders slumped. "It was fine. Like, you know… um. It went okay." Her lower lip twitched. Her eyes welled up.

Josie sat on her other side. "Okay, what really happened?"

Bea sighed. And let loose.

"So it was going really well. The staircase was perfect. They really wanted to go into the little door—like "Okay, yeah, I see it. But I guess I’m missing the storyline. What are you planning on having the voice say? That seems kind of important."

Bea grabbed the brief back with one hand, gesturing with the other and her light-up staircase.

Josie called after her, "Hey, can I get that tape when you’re done?" But Bea was already out the door. Josie shrugged and went back to her magazine.

Bea was sitting in the break room. And she was in a mood. Ted and Josie walked in, laughing. "I mean, the teeth thing is so overdone, but you made it feel fresh. That’s amazing."

Josie smiled but brushed it off. "It just kind of came to me. But I’m pretty sure the recall on that one is going to hit."

They felt Bea before they saw her. The emotional weather in the room was thick, heavy.

"Hey…..Bea, how did that staircase-mirror show go?" Ted asked. "I bet the multiple-voice one-mouth thing killed."

Bea didn’t look up from her Oodles of Noodles cup, stirring morosely. "Yeah, it was fine, I guess." She stabbed a rehydrated pea and brought it sadly to her mouth.

Josie and Ted looked at each other. Ted gave Josie the your turn look. Josie scrunched her face briefly, then recovered.

"Um, so… fine is fine, right? Do you want… to… I don’t know… taaaaalk about it or something?"

Bea stabbed her fork back into the noodles. Heavy sigh.

Ted, now genuinely concerned, sat down next to her. "Hey," he said kindly. "What happened?"

Bea looked up, shoulders slumped. "It was fine. Like, you know… um. It went okay." Her lower lip twitched. Her eyes welled up.

Josie sat on her other side. "Okay, what really happened?"

Bea sighed. And let loose.

"So it was going really well. The staircase was perfect. They really wanted to go into the little door—like REALLY wanted in. And they looked into the mirror and totally saw their mom. That was all perfect. But then the mom opened her mouth and out comes all this stuff. Like… a lot of stuff. I could barely keep up. Apparently, I chose the worst possible mirror reflection person."

Ted and Josie exchanged a glance.

"That doesn’t sound… so bad?" Ted asked.

Silence. Complete silence.

Bea finally replied, "Yeah, but they yanked the narrative right out from under me. I kept trying to bring focus back to the door, but The Dreamer and their mirror mom just kept on yacking. Suddenly that was the dream. I even started playing the song, but they drowned it out with their conversation. I had zero control. And the worst part? It was a GOOD storyline. Like, where they took it? It was actually compelling. I just kind of sat there and… watched."

Josie put a hand on her shoulder. "Hey, this sort of thing happens. It’s fine. The Dreamer probably won’t even remember. Maybe you can use some of it for something else next time?"

"No." Bea stood up, now gesticulating wildly. "And then suddenly? KITTENS. Like, so many kittens. I didn’t bring kittens into this thing. Where the fuck did the kittens come from?"

"Well," Ted started cautiously, "I guess from… cats?"

"THERE WERE NO CATS. God. I mean, wtf."

Bea started pacing.

"So Mirror Mother starts talking about how proud she is of The Dreamer and even though I had, like, six other people in the mirror and the mouth that was moving was NOT the mom, The Dreamer was like ‘oh wow, that’s so cool’ and then the mother was like ‘Here is a reward for everything amazing you ever accomplished’ And then suddenly? KITTENS. Like, biblical-plague levels of kittens. I didn’t bring kittens into this thing! Where the fuck did the kittens come from? And they were adorable! Which distracted me and soon I’m like, playing with kittens—I mean, I really don’t know how long exactly. But I look over and now Mirror Mom is leaning halfway outside the mirror, the mouthless chorus has stopped murmuring and THEY are each holding at least one kitten and The Dreamer and Mirror Mom are hugging. And there’s a laser light show—like the ‘get stoned and watch a laser show’ kind, complete with unicorns and shit. It just keeps building and building and I am—"

We cut to Bea’ point of view. Lasers flashing. Sky lighting up red, blue, yellow. Smoke everywhere. KITTENS. The Dreamer hugging Mirror Mom. Five mouthless figures, each holding a kitten. Bea looks down. Two kittens in her own hands, gazing up adoringly.

"—I am fucking loving it. Music swelling. Lights speeding up. Kittens flying through the air. All anchored around this hug."

Josie and Ted are spellbound. Josie lets out a soft "woooooow."

"And then?"

Bea looks at them, eyes wide.

"Silence."

"Oooooh," Ted says. "Overstimulation followed by—"

Josie finishes, "Long silences."

"What?” Bea shook her head, clearly confused.

Ted turned the brief to face her and pointed “Look here: It’s just like in the brief.”

Bea’ eyes got wide. “Omg. This was 100% written, directed, and starring… The Dreamer. I didn’t even need to be there. And the worst part? It was SUCH a good show."

She plopped back into her chair, fully pouting.

Josie rubbed her back, awkward but sincere. "Okay, but like, that mirror moment? That was all you. None of that could’ve happened without you."

"Yeah," Ted said. "And the little door! You said they really wanted to go into that door, right? That’s good."

Bea brightened, just a little. "Yeah, the door thing was really working. But I had this plan to bring it back at the end, and by then I was just… a passenger."

"So how did you end it? Or is it… still going?" Josie asked.

"Oh, I just shut it down. After the long silence, I kind of snapped out of it."

Back on stage, Bea looked down. Her hands were empty. No kittens. The lights and fog were gone. Her props the mirror, tiny door, and staircase sat in front of the Dreamer, who was beginning to fade. Bea thought she saw them look directly at her giving her a smile and thumb’s up? The Dreamer faded. Then vanished.

Bea shook her head and hit a button. Lights up. A red curtain lowered with the words: Thanks for coming, get home safely.
wanted in. And they looked into the mirror and totally saw their mom. That was all perfect. But then the mom opened her mouth and out comes all this stuff. Like… a lot of stuff. I could barely keep up. Apparently, I chose the worst possible mirror reflection person."

Ted and Josie exchanged a glance.

"That doesn’t sound… so bad?" Ted asked.

Silence. Complete silence.

Josie put a hand on her shoulder. "Hey, this sort of thing happens. It’s fine. The Dreamer probably won’t even remember. Maybe you can use some of it for something else next time?"

"No." Bea stood up, now gesticulating wildly. "And then suddenly? KITTENS. Like, so many kittens. I didn’t bring kittens into this thing. Where the fuck did the kittens come from?"

"Well," Ted started cautiously, "I guess from… cats?"

"THERE WERE NO CATS. God. I mean, wtf."

Bea started pacing.

"—I am fucking loving it. Music swelling. Lights speeding up. Kittens flying through the air. All anchored around this hug."

Josie and Ted are spellbound. Josie lets out a soft "woooooow."

"And then?"

Bea looks at them, eyes wide.

"Silence."

"Oooooh," Ted says. "Overstimulation followed by—"

Josie finishes, "Long silences."

"What?” Bea shook her head, clearly confused.

Ted turned the brief to face her and pointed “Look here: It’s just like in the brief.”

Bea’ eyes got wide. “Omg. This was 100% written, directed, and starring… The Dreamer. I didn’t even need to be there. And the worst part? It was SUCH a good show."

She plopped back into her chair, fully pouting.

Josie rubbed her back, awkward but sincere. "Okay, but like, that mirror moment? That was all you. None of that could’ve happened without you."

"Yeah," Ted said. "And the little door! You said they really wanted to go into that door, right? That’s good."

Bea brightened, just a little. "Yeah, the door thing was really working. But I had this plan to bring it back at the end, and by then I was just… a passenger."

"So how did you end it? Or is it… still going?" Josie asked.

"Oh, I just shut it down. After the long silence, I kind of snapped out of it."

Bea shook her head and hit a button. Lights up. A red curtain lowered with words she hadn’t written: Thanks for coming, get home safely.

Back in the break room, they just stared at her. Ted’s eyes were big, Josie’s mouth hanging open. The printer went off, Bea didn’t even look over at it. Ted shook his head, stood up and walked over and with an “Oh this one is all me” he rips it off and walks out the door, reading the briefing, passing Nash and Bahrat who are just walking in.

“Did you hear about the mess down in ADT? Apparently kittens all over the world suddenly like..had the same dream? All at the same time? Any sleeping kitten just suddenly was like… dream over and closed out of whatever dream they were having. And no one knows where they went.” Bahart crossed the room to the coffee machine while he broke the news.

Bea and Josie exchanged a quick look. “Um…” Bea started nocommitally “That’s weird, right? Do they have any idea what, like, caused it?”

“Nope” Nash chimed in “But we’re taking like thousands of kittens, not one over like 3 months old and all at the same time. It can’t be a coincidence.”

“Oh” Josie said, a bit too causally. “That’s like yeah so crazy. Huh, so anyone have any good gigs today?” She sat up, smiling just a little too big. They were on to her.

“Josie, what did you do?” Bahrat said, leaning across the table towards her.

“What, me? Nothing! I was playing tooth, tooth, goose with some 7 year old. I haven’t done anything with kittens in weeks.” She sat back, arms crossed defensively across her chest.

Bea was looking through a magazine, suspisiciously quiet. Bahrat looked at her, looked at Nash, looked at Josie. Back to Bea. He sat silent for a few seconds. Now everyone was looking at Bea. She finally looked up with a sigh.

“Ok, so that might have been me losing control to The Dreamer and they might have suddenly summoned like ALL the kittens. Somehow?” With a shrug she tried to go back to her magazine. But Nash wasn’t having it. Her mouth was wide open and she was trying to process. “But like…wait…how, exactly? The Dreamer took over THAT MUCH ?”

“Fine” She put down the magazine with a slap. “I got distracted. there were kittens, and a laser light show and it was – honestly it was brilliant. This Dreamer isn’t like some ordinary Dreamer. They had…” Bea paused, and looked a little impressed “they had style. It was a really good dream, ok?”

Bahrat nods. “Yeah, yeah. Kittens and lasers, good stuff. But also some sort of tear in the dream fabric? Bad stuff. Like Lucid levels of control and we are not supposed to be putting on those shows. That is way above our pay grade and – no offense Bea – our experise.”

“Hey, I get you, I in no way want to fuck with the Lucid stuff. But like, I pulled the brief, I did the work, and honestly, if a few kittens...”

“A few thousand kittens” Nash corrected

“Fine” Bea nodded “a metric shit ton of kittens got pulled into this dream for a bit, but do we really need to write it up? Everything is back the way it should be, I have learned a valubale lesson about not giving The Dreamer and inch beause they will take a mile”

“A mile of fucking kittens” Ted grinned as he looks in the fridge, checks his brief, pulls out a container of potato salad, sniffs it, puts it back making a face, closes the door and moves over to the cabinets above the sink, searching for the right props.

“Bea, we’re absolutely writing it up” Bahrat says, walking over to the incedent report box and tearing off a slip of paper from a pad above it. He grabs a pen. “What time did you log it?”

Bea blinks. “Oh my god. I forgot to log it.”

Josie puts down her coffee. “YOU DIDN’T LOG THE DREAM?”

Bea groans, pulling the tape recorder out of her bag.

“It was a lot, Josie. I kind of had a lot going on after it was all over and like… I had my own emotions that I needed to tend to. Self care? Perhaps you know her?”

Ted, head still inside a cabient: “She said the kittens were biblical, she didn’t say they were billable.” Pulls out a can of baked beans with a grin and tosses it into his bag.

Bea slams her forehead on the table. “ohhhhh noes”

Nash comes over, and pulls up a seat next to Bea. She looks at Bahrat. “Hey, can I see that brief for sec?” she says, putting out her hand. Bahrat crosses the room and hands her the brief. She looks at it for a second, then she crumples it up and eats it.

“Wait…what” Bea looks at her, eyes wide in disbelief and Nash keeps chewing, drinking a bit of water to help disovle it. Josie is thrilled, throwing her arms around Nash.

“Omg, Giril! Way to fucking solve a problem. I love this side of you!”

Nash blushes and swallows the last of the brief with a gulp. Ted is speechless, staring at the action at the table with a small smile, but Bahrat? Bahrat is so obviously not a huge fan of this move.

“Oh, cool, good. Very very good. We just pretend like nothing happened then?” He says looking at Nash. Then Bea. Then back to Nash.

“You all realizes this is wildly unethical?, right?”

No one says a word. “Cool, just checking.” He throws up his hands gently and grabs a magazine. The printer starts going off and Bea quickly jumps up.

“I love this plan, great idea, Bharat.”

She runs over to it, tears the brief off almost before it finisihes printing.

“Ok, thank you all, wonderful bonding experience, can’t wait to fuck up again so we can all kumbaya. Cheers!” and she runs out.

Then she pops her head back in quickly “um….thank you, guys” and then she was gone.

Briana Bolger 8/8/25 Briana Bolger 8/8/25

Bacon Life

“Another flying dream, Ted?” Josie said, looking at him with mild pity.

Ted had a cape in one hand, a jar of cotton balls in another and a small electric fan under his arm. He slung the cape over his shoulder and shrugged. “Eh, I don’t mind it too much. It’s kind of a kick looking at the joy on their face as they fly through the “sky”.

“Or the pure terror, I mean, that can be kind of funny, too” Nash said. “My last flyer was also a screamer”

“There must be some way to make it… I don’t know. More interesting? More… meaningful? Let me see your brief” Bea held out her hand

“Ok, first of all” Bea got up and yanked the cape from Ted’s shoulder “no capes” She pointed at the briefing.

“Oh, well, yeah, ok there’s that” he mumbled. “But I mean this cape is rather… scarfy?”

“What about this meat thing? That looks like it could be cool” Bea said as Josie and Bharat walked in just then, both of their ears perking up at that last sentence. “Meat thing?” Josie asked.

Ted winced and read from the brief: “A blink and you’ll miss it meat reference. But It’s not even mandatory, just” he makes exaggerated air quotes “appreciated. Whatever that even means.”

Bea steps up “It means, stretch goals! It means it gives you an excuse to almost go off brief. To make a flying dream…”

“It’s really more of a hover with a ribbon” Ted interrupted

Bea doesn’t even notice “… a lot more interesting. So, who’s got a meat reference? I’ll go first: a passing flight of sausage birds!”

Josie giggled. “Ok, um…one cloud made of mortadella”

Bharat joined in “What about if suddenly The Dreamer realizes that everything below is made of bacon? Including The Dreamer, but just for like 3 seconds.”

Bea and Josie looked impressed, Ted just looked uncertain. “How am I going to pull that off, and like, why would I?”

“Duh, for the lols, obvi” Josie said, flopping down into a chair around the table

“No, Josie” Bea corrected “it’s to elevate the dream experience and maybe even create a core memory” She got excited “this is your chance to make a lasting impression, you could change their entire relationship to themselves and the world around them!”

“With…3 seconds of bacon?” Ted wasn’t buying it

“With 3 seconds of bacon MAGIC” Bea corrected. “Seeing that everything, even and especially the self, is made of bacon and that it’s all connected? Deep stuff, right there. Maybe even award winning.”

Ted looked up “Wait. Award winning what? What award?”

Josie stood up, arm making a glamourous sweeping motion as she said “The Dreamies” in an awestruck voice, eyes looking at something beautiful, far away. Suddenly her face went back to her normal semi-sneer, and she fell back into her seat. “But Basic never wins anything, it’s all Prophetic or Abstract Surrealism sweeping it. Which is bullshit because most of those dreams are award bait anyway. Like, they game the briefs so that they can make these insane statements.”

Bharat rolled his eyes ever so slightly “That’s not entirely true. Occasionally a night terror or Lucid situation gets something.”

“Yeah, but with Lucid you need to really watch the rights because that can get tricky, which is why they get passed over a lot, too.” Nash added, looking up from her shoebox diorama, and then immediately going right back to it.

Bea nodded, moving over to Ted. “Right but this thing here” she pointed to the brief “this ‘meat moment’ could really get their attention! Think of it: Basic Dream Division doing a little art moment that really makes everyone think ‘oh hey, not that basic’ am I right?”

“Ok, all right” Ted was getting into it. “So, like… bacon life. Then back to real world and The Dreamer is going to be like wait…did I even see that? Is everything bacon? Am…am I bacon, too? And then slap bang back to normal. Yeah, I can see how that could be a thing. Memorable, but not like… scary or foreboding”

“Oh absolutely, you need to walk that line carefully. We can’t get into any of that. Just a normal dream experience but…” Bea winked “slightly elevated”

“Bacon life. Bacon life. Bacon life!” the chant started going up from the others until Ted joined in “BACON LIFE! I’m going to do it!”

“Yay! That’s the spirit” Bea took a post it and wrote Everything is bacon, even you on it and handed it over to Ted. “Go get ‘em! And do not forget to grab a ribbon from props”

Ted grabbed the post it note and headed out the door. As soon as it closed, Josie looked at the others

“He’s going to fuck it up, right?”

“No, he might actually pull it off, don’t be so negative” Bea replied with a shrug “although, yeah, I mean there is a good chance he’s going to fuck it up.”

The printer started up, Bea walked over to it “I kind of want to do something to get a Dreamy now, too” she said, tearing off the brief

She looked at it, sighed. “yeah, this might not be the one” and headed out the door to props, grabbing a pen off the table as she left.

“I flew too close to the sun” Ted sighed

“Well, technically you hovered too close to the sun?” Josie tried to cheer him up. “Honestly, it’s not that bad.”

Bea walked in, a form in triplicate under her arm that she tossed directly into the bin upon entering. “oh hey!” she said, brightening when she saw Ted “Bacon Life! How did it go?”

“Welllllllll. It was… I mean it was probably memorable at least? I guess I should pull a retention rate on it and see. But it was honestly a little…well a little long. I don’t think the Dreamies are going to be knocking down our door on this one” Ted said looking down and fiddling with a red ribbon tied around his wrist.

“Ok, what happened” Bea sat down, all ears.

“So the hovering thing was fine, and The Dreamer seemed to really understand the ribbon almost intuitively, like left makes you hover a little to the left, right and you hover a bit more right… easy peasy. After a few minutes of that, and they were comfy and content, I was like ok, time for the bacon bit. I held up the sign and on cue” Ted snapped his fingers “it was all bacon, the world, the dreamer, all of it”

Bea was smiling, nodding along “omg, sounds perfect! Cinematic, even!”

Ted looked back at her, seriously. “It was, it really was. And that was why I chose exactly that second for the invisible choir. Like, really sell it, you know?”

“Yes! Perfect timing, right? The drama, the glory, the bacony goodness of life, the universe and everything!” Bea was fully onboard, but wondering why the glum look.

“Yeah, that was the plan, but the chorus humming in dissaproval kind of… well it actually kind of took The Dreamer out of the momenet and I think they thought that the choir was like, signalling that Bacon Life was not Best Life, that it was more like…”

“the sizzle went fizzle” Nash intteruped.

“Yeah, basically” Ted nodded. “It was like all of the sudden there was this kind of ‘wait, we’re all just meat and my bacon is like not any different than the bacon I had for breakfast”

“Which, honestly, I mean, true. So that doesn’t seem to be a huge problem, right? I mean, memorable, meaningful, maybe even like a life changing dream?” Josie tried, helpfully.

“Well, yeah, but no because then suddenly The Dreamer was like ‘fuck hovering, I am just going to go to town on this all’ and started to eat their own arm.”

“Ewwwwwwwww” everyone in the break room recoiled in utter grossness.

“Yeah, exactly, so I shut it all down before it got too dark” Ted got up and shrugged. “So yeah, maybe they’ll remember it, or bits of it”

“Bacon bits of it” Josie added not looking up from her magazine.

Briana Bolger 8/8/25 Briana Bolger 8/8/25

Wake me up before you oh no

Maybe that wasn’t such a good idea, after all.

Josie, Ted and Bea stood there staring at the brief. Not talking, not even touching it. Just circled around it like they had never seen a print-out before.

It was Ted who broke the silence. “That” he pointed down at the piece of paper on the table, finally taking his eyes off of it and looking at his collegues “that’s a Lucid Ops Brief. What the actual fuck is it doing here?”

Bea still couldn’t look away. She’d never seen one of these before. ‘Lucid tone protocol’ was like, maybe coolest thing she might have ever heard. Nestled realities? Like what does that even mean?

“Well… um…” Josie stammered, eyes still gluded to the wayward brief. “Obviously we need to… I guess reroute it or something?” Ted nodded.

This finally broke Bea out of her stupor. “No way, no WAY! We can do this! Come on, this is like absolute fun. The coolest thing to come our way since ever! We HAVE to do this.”

“We absolutely do NOT have to do this” Ted said, backing away “it’s looking for no fewer than three reality shifts. I don’t even know how to do one reality shift. We are way out of our league here.”

Nash had walked in, unnoticed so everyone jumped a bit when she said “That’s not true, we do reality shifts all the time, we just call them openers.” She took a bite of an apple, looking down at the brief “Oh, Lucid Ops brief. Reroute that shit” and then sat down at the table, still chewing.

“Nash” Bea started, sitting down next to her “what if we were to…you know…not reroute it and just kind of…you know…do it?” Nash’s face didn’t change at all. She took another bite of her apple. Chewed. Swallowed. “That would be dumb. We can’t handle this sort of thing.” She took another bite of apple. Case closed.

Josie surprisingly was kind of feeling this brief, too. “Look, I get that it’s a challenge but I mean, aren’t you the least bit curious what goes on in one of these? What The Dreamer is like? I mean” she looked directly at Ted “you were just saying that if you have to do one more tooth loss thing, you’re going to start pulling your own teeth out.”

He rubbed his tounge around his mouth, feeling his teeth. She did have a point. This certainly wasn’t the same old feeling of loss sort of deal. “Ok, but who is going to take, it, though? I mean, I don’t feel like I could handle” he scanned the brief “avoiding changing matter states, like how do I know when I’m even doing that? So how do I acttually avoid doing something that I don’t know if I’m doing? See, brain already bent.” He sat down next to Nash.

Bea sat down as well. “It obviously can’t be one of us. It has to be all of us. Working together. Because together we can do anything!” She finished with a flourish, arms outstretched like the most positive airplane you’ve ever seen.

“Ok, I’m with my little pony over here, just with a little less “friendship is magical.” Josie finally sat as well. But we need to have a solid plan, really good props and importantly, an exit strategy if things get too wonky.” She looked over at Bea “And if we can do that, I’m in.” Bea clapped her hands in front of her excidtedly, looking over at Nash and Ted.

Ted just kind of shrugged and gave a thumbs up. If everyone else is going, he wasn’t going to stay behind, but he made a mental note to figure this glass thing out. Which was quickly overwritten by thoughts about lunch.

Nash was quiet. She looked at the brief again. The locked door thing seemed simple enough. The object that shouldn’t exist is pretty basic, getting it to know it would be a bit harder, but not impossible. Two versions of the same person who are both wrong, child’s play. And getting the phrase in there, no brainer. What concerned her most was this thing about ending in a room that’s also a memory that’s also a lie. With a non-lucid dreamer, that’s just a basic bedroom set with a post it note that says “childhood” next to a bus stop sign that says bus stop. But for a lucid dreamer, it’s going to have ot be better than that. Dream logic won’t be doing as much of the heavy lifting as usual, so they need to be really polished.

“If we use mirrors for the person, so it’s them but not, and coat one of them with vassoline then The Dreamer will see themselves, hopefully, as a younger version of themselves. That works for basic, at least. I think I can put together something with a tape loop that can “feel” like an object that shouldn’t exist, the knowing it part, we’ll have to wing.”

Bea and Josie looked at each other, omg it’s happening! “So you’re down?” Bea asked.

“Sure” Nash said, finishing her apple and tossing it into the bin. “Let’s do this thing, but we need to do it now, before Bharat comes back because he used to work Lucid and won’t even talk about it. He would reroute this so fast.”

Ted was excited. Adventure time! “I’m going to bring some dream fuel for us!” Bea looked at him with a giant question mark on her face. “Snacks!” Bea shook her head.

“I am not calling you ‘Version 7’, Ted.” Bharat said, shaking his head. “And in a few hours you won’t want me to anyway, trust and believe. I can’t understand how you guys thought you could handle this?”

Josie looked up from her magazine and shrugged. “Ainakaan se ei ollut taas vitun hammasuni.”

Briana Bolger 8/7/25 Briana Bolger 8/7/25

There’s no I in Dream

“So we really have to do this?” Bea said, looking at the memo tacked to the corkboard on the wall. “We’ve never had like a… motivational lunch? Group get together?”

“Team mixer!” Ted said, holding up a bottle of vodka and a giant sippy cup.

“Mandatory team mixer” Bharat grabbed the bottle of vodka from Ted, putting it back into the freezer. “And you know that this is in response to that little lucid caper you guys pulled.”

“Which is a good thing, actually, because if we break down some um…” Nash squinted at the memo “… silos… then maybe we can understand a bit more about what other departments are doing, and maybe even, you know, learn from each other.”

Josie looked at Nash. She came closer, looking her up and down, sniffing. “Who are you even? Learning from each other? Absolute loser behavior. I’m not going.” Josie floped down into a chair, picking up a magazine, done with this stupid matter.

Bea was still squinting at the memo. “Ok, but look, here it’s talking about opportunites for collaboraton that could actually be kind of cool. I wouldn’t mind taking a stab at a dream for a goat or a bunny or something? Think the ADT is going to be there?”

“I’m pretty sure they will be, the whole ‘attendance required’ thing seems to imply that it'll be like… everyone. Even those freaky nightmare people. I ran into one of them at the gym and they were seriously intimidating. Except when it lifted weights, it made this haunted howl sort of noise each time it did a set. Like EROSOSOOOOOOOAAAHGGGghHHEE” Ted tried his bests to imitate the noise, making a litlte scrunchie face at the end. “Honestly, I was a little embarrased for it. I didn’t see it carring a towel around, either.”

“Ew.” Josie said without looking up. “Ok, so who does our work while we go to this waste of time? Does everyone just not have any dreams while we bond and make plans to to increase emotional ROI and maximize recall rates?”

Bahrat rasied a finger “Ah, it’s held in a time pocket. All of the FlexSpaces are looped out of time, so no matter how long it goes, no time has passed in reality. The tech behind it is really pretty cool.”

“Oh, sweet, I feel like the coolest part is that we have to attend this forever-fest AND still complete a full workload.” Josie was still not having it.

“Yeah, but…” Ted was fully onboard. “pizza!” He’d already snuck the vodka bottle back into his bag.

As they walked into FlexSpace C they saw a table with Hello My Name Is tags and a variety of pens. Ted was the first to reach for it, writing a big T E D in red marker and proudly sticking it to his overalls. Bea recluctantly grabbed for one, writing her name much smaller, Bharat and Nash grabbed nametags as well, while Josie looked right past the table, pointing at the screen “Oh, cool. Get ready for more good times, date TBD.”

A large screen in the front of the room had a super important message for people entering the space:

Small groups of five to six people stood around, talking quietly and checking out each new group that came in. The lighting was low, and the mood seemed to match. At least it smelled like pizza.

A small woman, wearing a very beige two piece suit with an oatmeal blouse and taupe shoes was moving towards the group, looking like she was trying really, really hard to smile but her eyes were not feeling it.

“Ah, the Basic Dreams Department. Welcome, so nice to see you.” She looked at Bea and even her mouth gave up the whole trying to smile thing. “It’s wonderful that your little… escapade? Helped… uncover? A few things we need to… optimize.” She ended with the slightest attempt at the smile, but again, not happening. “My name is Angelica and I’ll be leading this… event? So if you have any questions or want to… talk? About anything, please find Marcell,, because I will be far too busy.” And with that, she lost all pretence in being interested and walked away.

“Oh, well that’s really… um” Nash started

“Disturbing?” Josie immitated Angelica. “This whole place smells of comproimise and middle management monotony. I did not sign up for this. And I am not signging up for that, either,” she said pointing at the screen “But since I’m here, let’s go get‘procure’ some pizza.” and off she stomped. Ted enthusiatically joined her, and Nash followed behind, adhearing her nametag to her overalls as she walked.

Bea looked at Bahrat .“I feel like good old Angelica isn’t real happy about having to do this thing, and I kind of felt like she wasn’t super happy about me in particular?”

Bahrat was waving at someone across the room who was very, very tall and looked a bit opaque in their middle region. Without looking at Bea he said “HQ never wants to deal with stuff, it’s actually a good thing that we… you… forced them to have a little get together. I’m going to go say hi to Hank” and off he went.

Bea watched him go, and then started scanning the room for her friends. She didn’t see them, but she did see three people – two men and a woman dressed in black overalls – on the other side of the room staring at her. Not talking, not moving, just staring. One of the was floating. Floating and staring. She looked around to make sure it was, in fact, her they were focused on, and sure enough, nothing else in her direction. She looked back. They were still looking at her. She sighed and walked over to them.

“Um, hi there. I noticed you glaring at me and thought I should come say hello. My name is" she pointed at her nametag “Bea, and I see that you are ... Pitor, Georgio and smiley-face-triangle-bear-emoji?” as she read their nametags she realized their overalls weren’t black, but rather a deep oxblood colour. “So um, which department are you from?” She smiled her best coworker smile.

“We’re from Llucid” Georgio said as if a lucid piece of trash had just asked him the dumbest question ever. “And we know who you are.”

“Oh, ok. GREAT” She kept her smile firmly in place, not wanting to give them the sastisfaction of how squirmy and gross they were making her feel. “What a super interesting department you work in, it’s so… oh hey” she waved at no one “I need to go. Over to there.” She pointed noncommitally towards ‘away. “But let’s catch up over some pizza later and you can tell me all about how having The Dreamer take over your job every time must get really old. Bye!” and she walked away, smile dropping.

Walking past the drinks table there was coffee, red punch, orange punch and what looked to be some sort of bubble tea? Maybe? Something with stuff floating in it anyway that didn’t seem like an accident. She grabbed a glass and since it seemed like there was a lot of the red stuff left, but orange was going fast, she ladled in some of the orange stuff, taking a sip and then looking at it. Did it taste a little boozy, or was that wishful thinking?

Ted caught her eye across the room, raised his glass of also orange punch, and gave Bea a quick metal sign. She gave him a little half wave back, and he went back to laughing with the group of people in yellow overalls which was… ORA? Or maybe Dream Media Systems? She made a mental note to get to know who wears what before the next one of thes thingies and also why and how was Ted enjoying this so much?

Nash came up next to Bea, and took a sip of her own orange punch. “Ted spiked it, obviously.” She took another long sip. Bea sighed. Of course he did. She took a big old gulp. Thank you, Ted.

The lights started to flicker off and on, as Angelica stood at the podium in front. “Hello, thank you, if we could all..? Take our seats now, we can..? Get started. Hi, thank you, please be…. seated? Yes? Ok, then thank you. Thank you.”

Everyone moved more or less back into their teams and sat together. The room was quiet, Angelica looked pleasedish. She began to speak and as she did, a lithe man elegantly dressed head to toe in shades of ecru, bland but well tailored stood up and walked to the podium next to her.

“Ok, so this is Marcell Munth, he is the Deputy Associate Director of Lateral Dream Alignment and he’s going to be speaking…? About a very important topic? Understanding Dream Briefings. Thank you…? Marcell.

He confidnetly stood in behind the podium. Clearly confident and happy to be given a platfrom. He raised his arms in greeting: “Good midcycle to you all, dream team.”

“It’s such a joy to see so many departments represented here today.” He looked around the room, nodding at each department as he spoke “From Basic to Lucid, from Prophetic to… Environmental, I think? Yes, great to see you. We are, each of us, a necessary thread in the tapestry of collaborative unconscious content creation.” Josie and Nash exchanged a glance. This guy was good.

He moved out from behind the podium, a little closer to the audience, his sand coloured microphone semi visible against his skin. “Now, we all know that dreaming is not a solo sport. Nor is it a team sport. It’s… well, it’s more like parallel jogging. In the fog. With headphones in. But in the same general direction. That’s why today, we’re reiterating our shared values of cooperative non-collaboration, or what we like to call…”

Dramatic pause as his first slide came up. It said Working Together, Apart™ in big, bold sans serif across the screen. He looked at it, smiled and continued. “Working Together, but apart. Now, this might sound contridictory, but hey, we in the dream biz know a thing or two about contridictions, am I right?” He laughed, and a few people in the audience nodded along. Ted let out a full on “you said it, man!” and slapped his knee. Marcell’s smile cracked just the slightest as he looked over at Ted, but continued.

Let’s take a moment to align on rerouting etiquette. If you receive a brief that contains, say, prophecy markers, animal symbolism not covered by your sector, or emotional resonance above 8.7, we ask that you don’t try to ‘wing it,’ or as one team did last quarter, to” and here he used air quotes “’see what happens if we just make it funnier.’”

Bea slumped down in her char a little bit, swallowing the last of her orange drink. The beverage station was soooo far away. She slumped a little more.

Marcell hit his clicker, went to the next slide which read:

He continued: “The 3R method is your friend. It can stop you from doing something inappropriate. For example, if a brief isn’t yours, you can what?” He looked around for a second, no one said anything “That’s right, you can assume it isn’t yours. Even if it feels exciting. Especially if it feels exciting. Excitement is a red flag.” Click. Next slide.

Curiosity is the leading cause of cross-sector contamination.

“Now, I want to touch on boredom and curiosity.” He lookd stratigh out into the crowd. “Those twin motivators that drive so much of our best and, unfortunatley also our worst work. It can lead to innovation, sure, but also to breach events, temporal bleed, and, in one case, a colleue who is in this very room right now, who was made entirely of glass for over two weeks.”

He looked right at Bea. Everyone looked at Bea. Bea looked straight ahead.

“So if you feel curious, Instead, pause. Breathe. Consider the infinite spirals of consequence. Remember the proper Interdream Protocol Chain of Command™. Every brief was approved by Dream Legal, but only for activation by the assigned team. Which brings us to this…” Click.

If it isn’t your dream to dream, don’t dream it.

“Rembmer, when you feel that itch to do more… consider doing less. And whatever you do, make sure that it really is your job that you are doing. Not The Animal Dream Department’s job because you are” Air quotes. Again. “’curious’ about what kind jobs you can do when The Dreamer is a sparrow. Let me tell you, the years and years of experience it takes to get that kind of thing right” He looked over at the ADD, in their grey overalls, sitting up proudly and smiling. “You guys are doing a great job, by the way, keep it up”

He looked back at the screen. And repeated the line that was still up there in that same big bold sans serif font.

“So that’s what I want you to take with you today, as I wrap this up, although this is not really a conclusion so much as a transition into pizza” More laughs and general chuckles. He had them eating out of his hand, and he knew it.” He smiled.

I leave you with our Q3 mantra: ‘If it isn’t your dream to dream, don’t dream it.’ Thank you. And remember: you are not alone… but please act like you are.”

People were clapping, Bea got up, and headed straight for the door. Josie followed, grabbing the rest of the orange punch. In the hallway, Josie caught up to Bea.

“Hey, don’t let those dweebs make you feel any sort of way. First off, it was ALL of our decision. Secondly, those people would not understand a good idea if it was on slide 5 of their boring ass powerpoint.” She made a yuck face. “and C?” Her face brightened as she held the half-full punch container up “Orange stuff! And if we go to finish this bad boy off in “REM Spark West” I believe that meeting room ⁄ exists outside of time, so no one will even miss us”

Bea grinned, half hugged her friend, being careful not to spill the punch, and they started moving in the direction of REM Spark West, hitting a non ADD vending machine along the way.