Dreams and Delusions

By Igor De Alcantara

One person can hold absolute control over people’s dreams and nightmares. This person can access anybody’s mind and insert in it whatever images he wants. Dreams and Delusions is a fantasy and adventure novel which talks about the evolution of a human being to an almost divine condition.

Charles Bourbon had never had a bad dream in his whole life. He dreams every night, always about good things, and he can remember in details every single dream he has ever had, since the first one, when he was seven years old. When he tells it to someone, he’s seen as a liar. “Something like that can’t happen”, they say. The fact is that this is true.

At his twenty-seven years old, Charles had a terrible nightmare, the first one of his life. This event seems more real than ever. What happens after that is a long and dangerous journey filled with musical, mythological and literary references ranging from Kafka to Gaiman, Jim Morrison to The Beatles, through serial killers, monks and maniacs.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Igor De Alcantara
• Release date: Dec 3, 2014
• ISBN: 9781310699009

Igor De Alcantara

Nascido na pequena cidade de Janaúba-MG em 07 de Maio de 1977, Igor Alcantara mudou-se logo cedo para Brasília-DF, onde viveu a maior parte de sua vida, tendo morado ou visitado quase todas as unidades da federação.Desde cedo ele foi levado a ler compulsivamente. Como estudava no período da manhã e morava longe, só podendo voltar para casa à noite, gastava suas tardes em uma biblioteca de Brasília.Por isso, desde seus nove anos de idade, leu diversos clássicos da literatura. Aos dez anos já conhecia a obra de Oscar Wilde, aos onze já havia lido Homero e Dante e aos doze, todas as peças de Shakespeare e boa parte dos livros de Kafka, Dostoievski e Machado de Assis, seus autores preferidos.Seu primeiro conto, “A Flor de Moscou” foi escrito aos onze anos. Desde então ele nunca parou de escrever. Boa parte do que produziu foi perdido, mas algumas coisas ainda persistem. Outras tantas obras ele simplesmente escreveu como presente a alguns amigos, não guardando cópias das mesmas. Já algumas foram perdidas durante o tempo.Igor Alcantara é um autor que acredita que escritores precisam se arriscar em terrenos antes não explorados. Por este motivo seus livros são de estilos diferentes entre si. É apenas saindo da "zona de conforto" que se pode realmente evoluir na arte das palavras.Apenas após os trinta anos de idade publicou algumas de suas obras escritas no passado e textos inéditos. Com as novas tecnologias gráficas, esse antigo sonho tornou-se realidade.Logo após a publicação, algumas de suas obras foram premiadas em diversos concursos literários, o que representou o início do reconhecimento de seu talento como escritor.Se quiser saber mais sobre Igor Alcantara, além de obter informações adicionais sobre este e outros livros, visite a página pessoal do autor:http://www.igoralcantara.com.br

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Preface

* Written in the online version of the book before it was done.

I do not know if I can call this work as a book, because there is no certain about its future. It may be that an editor asks me to publish this text, but is it really likely that this will not occur. Therefore, I will call what I am doing as Project.

Well, this project is quite unassuming. I have no ambition to become famous or that many people read what I write. I would like to be read, but this is not the point. What I hope is just to share with one or two people some ideas for stories that I have kept for so long just for me, in my inner dream world.

I am prepared for any kind of criticism, this is normal and in some ways is good, because it means that someone has lost their precious time reading what I write. In fact, I expect people to criticize and make suggestions about the project, the future of this text is always open and people can help giving it the direction they want, all within judgment, of course.

Some inspirations and references are obvious and I would like to quote them. The most glaring is about the work of Neil Gaiman, where it discourses about the Perpetuals, one or two of them especially most. Yes, this is a clear source of inspiration. But here I do not want to copy what Gaiman did or overcome him. This was just a source of inspiration among hundreds, which I will mention a few.

Since I am nine years old, I invest part of my time with reading classics. From this habit comes my two greatest influences: Kafka, with its metaphorical, introspective and distressing narrative, and Dostoyevsky and his brilliant and accurate descriptions of the common man. Never meant to copy their style, but as I read almost everything both published, more than once, the influence on my style is inevitable.

As you're about to read, you will find several references, many quite subtle, but most of my ideas was born from my poor, but insistent, imaginative head. I hope, as I said, you actively participate in this experience, or project. I hope that in reading these texts you find the same pleasure that I have when writing them.

And sweet dreams!

Additional Comments

This work is full of external references. I advise the reader to search on a few places or people mentioned to deepen your knowledge of the work. Visit my personal website on the Internet for specific hints about references and interesting facts about this book. I hope you enjoy the adventure that is about to begin.

The Author

Chapter 01

It is so dark that it is impossible to see anything. Absolutely nothing. He thought he was asleep, because he doesn’t remember getting there and didn’t know what he was doing in that place. By the way, what is this place? Where was he? He tries to push his memory, but it is hard to remember anything that has happened in the last few hours.

From the top of a huge building he could see the whole city beneath his feet. It was a beautiful nightfall, but he had no idea why he was standing there on the terrace. From the top of the more than forty floors building he was appreciating each tree, street, car and person he could see from a distance. The metropolis traffic in those dense avenues was intense. A disordered swarm of ambitious and unconscious insects.

Observing from such a distance, it didn’t seem that every spot represented a living-thinking being. Each vehicle had at least one person with his entire inner universe.  What would each one of those human beings be thinking of? How many wouldn’t see the dawn of the following day? For which problems have they been through? Would any of them have an unspeakable secret? Are they happy? Upset? Desperate? Anxious? Deluded? Why are there so many cars with so few people in them? When has the world become so selfish? Or have we always been so?

There were also the trees. Some native, but most of them would never live in that region if it weren’t the human interference. Each plant had a small surrounding biological system depending on its health. Insects, birds, small rodents, all living at the micro world.

As he was watching all these details, he noticed a little smoke coming from farther trees. Focusing a little more he noticed that a flame has enkindled, but he took it for granted as it seemed a small thing. He kept on observing the city and entertaining himself on his daydreams.

However, he was wrong as to the importance of the flame. The fire intensified quickly and soon took over a small gantry. Even though from a certain distance, he could see it all with an incredibly detailed accuracy.

Charles feared. People bordered the fire and not even looked aside. Were they all blind? He wondered. The fire propagated fast and nothing was done about it. No one even showed awareness of that fact. It was as if he was the only one, from the top of that so-far building, that could see the scene.

- How come they can’t see something like this if even I can see from where I am?

From a distance he saw a little bird that came out from the smoke and fled. He put his hand in his pocket and pulled out his cell phone. He needed to call the emergency and tell about what has happened so that something could be done about it. To his misfortune, the rush in the attempt to call made him drop the device, which was lost in space on its way to the floor.

The fire expanded. Now the smoke was already high and its color was mixed to the sky´s white clouds. The high flames had already destroyed nearly a hundred trees. Much less would have led many people to despair, but not those ones, not that evening. Once again everyone was walking dead, seeing nothing, saying nothing, showing no reaction.

The bird that came out of the smoke was now flying high, he almost believed that it was coming towards him. Charles decided to cry out for help. But as doing so, he realized that no sound came out from his throat. He didn’t know why and tried to yell louder, but it didn’t work. The more he forced his voice, the more his throat appeared to be useless. No sound was even whispered. At the same time the bird came closer.

Would it be a sparrow, a swallow or a pigeon? Which bird was that, that survived the fire and still keeps going with such a difficult flight trying to escape from the fire? As the fire spread throughout the city, he was trying to leave down the stairs in order to ask for help. But suddenly he saw that the terrace no more had doors nor stairs. How would he leave now?

He turned back to the parapet and had a great surprise. The fire had already burned down almost the entire city. There was no one else he could see, just the bird, which, by the way, wasn’t that small at all. Contrary to what he thought, as it approached, Charles realized how much bigger it was. The appearance was even more scaring, and it flew towards his direction. It then landed on the parapet of the building. It was a huge vulture with black feathers on its body and white neck and head. The size was larger than a common vulture. One could say that measured more than two meters in length and spanning more than five.

Charles looked up in order to see the vulture. He wasn’t afraid, although such reaction in front of this huge animal would be understandable. Then the bird looked at him and said quite calmly:

- Run, come on, run quickly!

He turned back and realized that he was no longer on the terrace. It was an arid field filled with towering dried trees. Not a single leaf was seen, only dead branches in a dark forest. There weren’t many trees, but enough to turn his escape into a difficult level.

He looked down and saw a red field, cracked and drained: it was dead. Everything in that place was desolation. The smell was ghastly. He turned to the side and the same giant vulture was devouring the bowels of a child who had an elephant-shape head. Facing a so-scared Charles, the vulture smiled and continued his meal.

Suddenly the whole deserted valley heard a voice crying out for help. It was a female voice. Beautiful and yet desperate. He didn’t know why and didn’t even wonder about it, but he felt it was his duty to help her and ran again, but now to the person who claimed for help.

At that moment the sound was different. A pack of wild dogs was running towards him. The bodies of those beings were exposed on the back and he could see their bones showing. Small pieces of meat out of their ribs, but they seemed not to feel any pain. Their skin was like a torn curtain. The eye holes were empty, but that didn’t prevent them from seeing Charles and chase him.

At that moment that he had to run even faster, all of a sudden, his legs weren’t working anymore. His efforts were huge, but he barely left the place. He tried to run at his full power, but each time he boosted, his escape speed was lower. Meanwhile the demonic dogs approached even more.

Suddenly the ground began to crack and he found himself in more trouble. The earth was slowly swallowing each of the trees and they were screaming as if they were in real pain. There were cries and whispers that mostly resembled the sound of dying bats. The whole world seemed to collapse into the erosions that were urging on the ground. Islands of earth were formed, separated by newborn gaps. The only one who seemed oblivious to all this was the vulture that, no matter how hard Charles ran, it just stood there beside him, calmly eating the flesh of some other animal.

From the opened gaps on the ground, a red dense liquid, which he immediately identified as blood, began to sprout. Startled, he tried once again to run, jumping over the gaps on the ground when suddenly he stumbled. During the fall, he hurt his back on a tree limb that was being swallowed by the ground. The wound caused him a really intense pain, and he realized that he was bleeding. This blood, redder than usual, began to drop from his body and as it mingled with the blood sprung from the earth, the two of them turned into a black fetid liquid. All of a sudden everything got that color, except for the sky, in a purple shade never seen before.

The Jane Doe's crying out for help continued. The pack that was chasing him came really close and was about to reach him when he finally was able to run. The pain made it harder to escape and save the owner of that voice. How has he come into such an absurd and unexplainable situation?

With great sacrifice, he jumped over the land islands created between the huge cracks and gradually saw a female image in a distance. His effort seemed to finally be worthy. He gathered his remaining energies and ran intensely. For several times he almost fell in the holes, but something seemed to conspire for his success.

Each step he was closer to the woman. Now he was so close that he could see her tied back to a tree. She was young and beautiful, and that he could assume even though he hadn´t seen her face. About three dogs were threatening her. They were prepared for the attack.

These were similar to those dogs that haunted him: empty eye holes, skinny look and body with ripped skin, exposing bones and muscles. However, there was something he only noticed at that time: instead of dog-paws those animals had human feet, covered by thick hair layers.

The mysterious woman had her life in Charles’ hands. He, in an act of courage, gets beside her begins to untie her. The dogs come closer to attack him and then she turns her face to warn him about the danger. However, when trying to do so, a new crack appears on the ground and he is swallowed by it. Yet he couldn’t even see her face.

He fell for a long time until he looked down and saw on the pit walls a number of mouths full of teeth that was swallowing everything that fell there. A mouth inside the other, in an infinite sequence.

On the brink to be devoured he woke up. The alarm clock was calling him for one more daily routine. He got up relieved and rushed to the bathroom to brush his teeth and take a quick shower. As usual the alarm clock has rung by several minutes and he was again late for work.

Chapter 02

Charles had never had nightmares before. When he told that to people, there was always someone coming up with some explanation. You’ve had nightmares for sure, but you just don’t remember them, said one. It is normal for our minds to block bad memories, philosophized others. But none of that convinced him. He knew that in his whole life he’s only had good dreams.

He always thought himself as privileged for that. Studies say that dreams are important to prepare the person for real difficulties in day-to-day life. Nightmares work as a training or simulation of several hardships. He didn’t care about that, though. Usually the opposite happened to him. When he had problems in his personal life, he knew everything would be fine while sleeping, at least in his few hours of asleep.

Another curious fact about Charles is that he could remember every single dream he has had in his whole life. Ordinary people forget their dreams minutes or hours after awaken. Not him. Every detail of every dream he had since he was seven years old, he remembered as if he had just dreamed about them.

That night, however, had been different. For the first time in his twenty-seven-years life he had had a nightmare. Not just that, he had never dreamed about something that seemed so real. That puzzled him, even though he was avoiding thinking about that, wondering that as all people have nightmares, sooner or later the same should happen to him.

He was so late that he barely had time to bathe. He wet his body for a few seconds, dressed up quickly, grabbed an apple and threw himself in the car. On the way, he got distracted thinking about the scenes that his mind had produced. The image of the vulture was stuck in his head. It was as if the bird knew him for a long time. Neither the dogs nor the floor opening or sprouting blood scared him more than the vulture’s mysterious smile.

However, the identity of the woman who cried out for help completely fulfilled his thoughts. Why she seemed so real? He remembered all the dreams he had had in his life and there has never been a so-vivid picture, striking and realistic as this young woman tied to the tree, threatened by the pack.

Without noticing, he had already parked his car and took the elevator. He went up to the seventh floor. Charles has been working in that engineering company for some years. This has been his third job, shortly after graduating. The company wasn’t renowned, but the working environment was friendly and the work was challenging, which represented an attraction to him.

- Hi Charles, late again? - Welcomed, laughing, his friend Barbra.

- Woke up late again. It was different though, weird - answered.

- Different? - Curiosity, women’s surname, spoke up.

- Yes, I had a strange nightmare.

- Nightmare? I heard right? Mister Charles Bourbon, who bragged himself of never having a nightmare, finally had one? - Said in a sarcastic tone.

- Seriously Barbra, don’t mock me.

The dialogue is soon interrupted by the arrival of Mr. Basilio, chairman of the company. He greeted them both and asked about the project that needed to be delivered the following day. He was pleased to know that everything was going according to plan and would probably be ready by the end of the day.

Basilio was about sixty years old and inherited the company from his father. Since the startup he had to deal with many people’s mistrust, from employees to customers. However, with his gentle and kind way, he gained everybody’s respect and revealed himself as an excellent manager, even though he didn’t understand much about engineering and architecture. He understood people and that was his guidance to success.

Charles was sitting at the table finishing the paper work ordered by a client when he felt a slap on his back. It was Gustav, coworker and friend since childhood. Both met by chance. Charles was involved in a fight and Gustav, who was nearby, helped him when he saw that his future friend was outnumbered. Hence a friendship between two people who were like brothers was born. They attended the same school for several years until they decided for the same university, where they graduated together.

When receiving the pat on the back, Charles felt a disturbing pain. He then asked his friend not to do that anymore, because he slapped really hard. Gustav didn’t understand that request and said it was just a friendly gesture, he had never pushed more than necessary in a prank like this.

At this point, Charles touched his back and both saw something that intrigued him more than anyone else. There were tiny blood spots staining his shirt. He has decided to wear black that day, so the marks were almost imperceptible. He went then to the bathroom to clean up.

He wasn’t surprise when looking at the mirror, now with the chest undressed, and saw a deep cut, healing by now, on his back. He shivered. He touched it and noticed that it was still wet. By the time he woke up, he was so late that he hadn’t noticed such cut. He remembered the nightmare and the moment he fell and hurt himself with a sharp tree branch. Had it really been only a dream?

The doubt was whether he told this to anyone or kept to himself. As much as he had friends like Gustav and Barbra, who he could trust, he was afraid of being labeled as weird or even crazy. He knew this story had no sense. It was such an absurd to think of something like this, that he started thinking that he excessively fantasized the nightmare and that cut was just coincidence. However, there isn’t such thing in the real world, everything happens for a reason.

The following day comes and along with it the presentation to the client. Besides the client and his team, there were in the room Charles, Barbra, Mr. Basilio and a newly hired: the talented engineer Pablo Belmonte. Mr. Basilio started the meeting and the follow-up, presenting the project. Once concluded, he left a moment for comments. The client liked what had been done, but Pablo intervened and suggested some improvements that were shortly approved. This fact has caused more work to Charles and Barbra, and more prestige to the company freshman.

- Who does this Pablo think he is? Ah, if only I could tell him what I’m thinking - Charles shouted to his friends, when they were alone.

- He wanted to make use of our work to promote himself. Why didn’t he do the project then? - Barbra replied, equally outraged.

It was Gustav who calmed them. He said that their talent was well-known and that no one would take their credits. Besides, Pablo’s ideas would eventually help them in the project, which ultimately would be good professionally, because in the future few would remember whose the suggestion was. After some time, what would remain were the authors of the project, the two friends, who would eventually take full credit for that accomplishment. It was really not worthy worrying about it, there would soon be something far more serious to bother.

Chapter 03

That night Charles, Barbra and some people went to Gustav’s house to celebrate his birthday. Each of the guests should take a CD that would run in the party, adding a special touch of each person to the ambience. Charles brought an old album by the band Dinosaur Jr.. Barbra, however, a diehard fan of The Flaming Lips arrived with the classic Hit the Death in the Future Head. Everyone enjoyed seeing what the others had selected.

Gustav seemed happy with his friends’ company in his apartment. Though Charles thoughtfully remained on the porch looking at the moon as he heard the lines Ride the snake, ride the snake to the lake, the ancient lake. He didn’t know why in these recent days so many thoughts came into his mind. He couldn’t be fully focused on his work. He looked at the dark sky and felt connected to each star, even so distant as they seemed.

When closing his eyes, unconsciously he began to see people and scenes he had never seen before. Fear was not the word that best described his state of mind. Maybe peace, the feeling of complete emptiness, fearless and free of ambitions, no sorrow nor joy, just peace. The more he got in this full state of relaxation, the sharper images came into his mind.

The wind was blowing on his face. His closed eyes could almost hear the roar of his new car’s engine. The speed was high in the dark and dangerous road. John Riddle speeded up increasingly with his beautiful car, the most precious thing he had earned. He had no fear, only happiness by enjoying the pleasure that it brought.

Maria Soledad felt very well. She parked in the garage and entered her house quietly after a hard day of work. She walked through the stairs and when she opened her room’s door she found her husband lying in bed with another woman. She froze seeing them naked. After two minutes of shock, she began to yell, but the couple ignored her presence and continued having sex right in front of her. They laughed, amused by her pain.

It was raining heavily. Kamau Bwalya was walking calmly down the streets letting the water wash-down his body. The wet clothes didn’t bother him anymore. He stopped at a bar, bought a beer and kept walking. A dim light was lighting on the deserted avenue. He walked for a while until there was nowhere else to go. A huge wall stopped him. He looked up and saw the electric fences that locked him in. He was surrounded by such thick walls. The silence was dramatically interrupted by his shrill yell. He was back in prison, how could that has happened? He had already served his sentence, why has he returned to jail? He knelt down and started crying while the guards approached to beat him, as back in the old days.

Barbra hugged him in an act of kindness and that made him come back to reality. He wasn’t sure for how long he was off, distant, but in all that time several images from all over the world attended his mind. Dozens of scenes, some bad and others good, but they were seen from a very close perspective, as if he knew what would happen later, as he was part of it. He remembered the faces of those people and he knew that he had known all of them, but he couldn’t remember any of those because he really had never seen them before.

- Why are you here alone? - Asked Barbra.

- No reason, just wondering - said Charles Bourbon.

- I read on your Twitter that you were upset with what Pablo did, meddling in our project. I didn’t like it either.

- Yeah, I've been thinking about it a lot. We’ve worked so hard on this project, even on weekends, and then this guy comes and tries to take all the credit - Charles replied, annoyed.

- Let's not think about it now, it’s Gu’s birthday, come, let's talk to the guys. - Invited Barbra, with a smile.

The two friends stayed in the apartment for two more hours and then left. As they planned to drink a few beers and some wine, they thought it was safer to go by taxi to Gustav’s house and so they needed to do the same in order to go back home.

- Why don’t we take the same car and I ask the driver to stop by at your house first? It isn’t that far. - Charles suggested.

- All right! - Barbra smiled and agreed immediately.

The place where they were was almost deserted. They had to walk for ten minutes to reach a busy avenue in order to get a cab. They took that way calmly as they were talking about several issues. They were friends since they first met in the company. Since then, something they enjoyed doing together was to talk.

They were witnessing a beautiful autumn night, walking away from the shadows reflected on the asphalt and from the rare mud puddles formed in the damaged-floor holes. For a moment they didn’t know what to say and a disconcerting silence was settled. Each one distracted by their own thoughts as leaves are falling from a tree in a large river and split up after a while. Maybe it was the temperature, perhaps only the worries and problems they faced, but after a few minutes it was difficult for anyone to pick up the conversation.

They went through a dark street on which its end there would be an access to the place where they hoped to find a taxi that would take each one to their own place. It turns out that half way of the alley, Charles noticed that they were not alone. Before he could start any reaction, he suddenly saw a thief armed with a long sharped knife, threatening their lives.

Paralyzed, Barbra was flurry and did nothing when the bandit demanded that both turned over their money and other valuables. She had no reaction, perhaps not believing that something like that could happen. Charles was just thinking about protecting his best friend, preventing any harm to happen. Thus, he asked her to hand over whatever the thief requested so they could go.

Rather than cooperate with the bandit, Barbra started to cry. This angered him deeply and he, visibly under cocaine influence, laid the knife towards her. Every time he remembers that fact, Charles shivers. The whole scene seemed to unfold in slow motion. The bending movement that the knife went through made the dim light of a streetlamp reflect in the blade and it almost blinded Barbra’s friend. He could see his face reflected in that evil piece of metal.

The knife slowly approached his friend’s chest. The thief's eyes were burning in rage flames. From his face sprang drops of sweat were running down like a salty spring rain. His breathing was fast and panting. Every muscle in his body seemed to vibrate wildly. His hand moved even more towards her. It was as if every second of this terrible time lasted twenty-one minutes.

Charles was already imagining his friend’s heart being hit by the knife and the blood vessels breaking into dozens of fragments. The blood would first blow toward the criminal’s face and the plasma taste would give his lips the thirst of violence, leading him to deliver another series of stabbings. The bandit's hands would be stained with red, but it was Charles’ soul that would be forever stained black, as in a deep grief.

The moon seemed to come closer so that it could see the scene, a fact that would change many people’s lives for a long time. Charles watched the scene in terror, knowing its outcome and upset because he couldn’t avoid it. What would he do after a trauma of such magnitude? How long would it take to recover from the pain? Not forgetting to mention the suffering for the loss of a great friendship.

In an act of impulse, Charles jumped ahead the thief and tried to push him away so that he couldn’t harm his friend. With Barbra’s death image in his head, the rage took place and even his brain’s most ordinary activities were interrupted for a few seconds. He’d never imagined that something like this could have happened, but then he found out that things just had to happen that way.

When trying to stay between the thief and Barbra, Charles took his hands against the bandit's body, touching him slightly. His surprise couldn’t be greater to see the guy in front of him fainting, unconsciously falling to the ground. What had just happened? He had only touched the unknown man’s body, how could this have caused his fainting? There was no violence, just a subtle touch, though full of rage.

The thief didn’t collapse by hitting his head somewhere, it was clear that he collapsed immediately after being touched by Charles and only after the blackout that he had fell. Unconscious, the bandit appeared to move his eyes frantically. The breathing was intense and his facial expression was contracted. Bourbon kneeled beside him and watched the scene with a mixed feeling of surprise and curiosity.

Barbra, recovering from the shock and seeing that they had no injury, stood beside the friend trying to understand what was happening. Charles closed his eyes and could see with great clarity a huge crater and at the bottom of it there was a person, a frightened man, naked and surrounded by various demonic beasts. He screamed, but they approached even more in order to devour him.

- Charles, what happened? Why he fainted? And why is he so agitated?

- Nothing Barbra, he's just having a nightmare.

Chapter 04

Charles was sitting on a rock at the edge of a huge cliff. From the top of the pointy rocks below he saw a huge and distant valley full of trees. A river was flowing between these trees. The weather on the mountain was full of serenity. A fresh wind cooled the air. Behind where he was, in a slightly higher place, there was an old tree, perhaps older than any tree that existed in the world, maybe even older than civilization. On top of this tree there was a perched vulture. They didn’t speak to each other, they were in peace watching the landscape.

In the valley he could see from distance all sorts of people and creatures, real and mystical. Some were running or dancing, and others were just suffering. From the top of the rocky hill nothing could be heard, it was the greatest silence that anyone could experience. He was just breathing, sitting on his rock, his feet dangling in the abyss. He wasn’t think about anything, just watched all that wide world that was presented.

He gets up and stands on the stone. It wasn’t night or day. It wasn’t cold or hot. It was nothing and it was everything at once. It was just a dream, wasn’t it? Is there anything that is just a dream? Is dreaming somehow the expression of our deepest and unconscious desires and fears? Can imagination be materialized in such a way to override the so-called real world?

As he turned back, Charles Bourbon saw a person who he knew very well. Standing beside the old tree there was Pablo Belmonte, his co-worker who tried to get more respect stealing the ideas and projects of others. He seemed confused, not knowing where he was, but when he saw Charles he had a strange and mistaken sense of tranquility.

Bourbon couldn’t explain exactly why, but he was sure he was dreaming. First, this place didn’t exist. Second, he didn’t know how he got there. Third, he found Pablo, the person for whom he had an enormous antipathy, but he had no courage to face him, as he respected his intelligence. Anyway, he took advantage of the fact that they are just dreaming to say what he always wanted to his dishonest coworker.

- Look who's here! Pablo Belmonte!

- My friend Charles Bourbon. Glad to see you too. Where are we?

- Well, I ask you not to call me friend. I can’t have a friend like you.

- Why are you so aggressive? What have I done to you? - Asked Pablo.

- What have you done to me? This week was just the last straw when you held me up to ridicule in front of the client, criticizing my work and Barbra’s. Not to mention the projects that you stole, going to Mr. Basilio and offering a better idea. You thought I didn’t know about it? And nothing convinces me that it wasn’t you who deleted the files from my computer two months ago. It happened the day that you were the only one late at night at the company. Do you think I don’t know these things?

- So you're mad at me because I was smarter and more competent than you?

- More dishonest is what you mean. What you did wasn’t right.

- You're an idiot, Charles. You do everything dead-on. You will end up losing everything being so. You have already lost your dignity and you will soon lose your job and even Barbra, too.

- Losing Barbra? Are you crazy? What are you talking about?

- Now, who are you trying to deceive? Everybody in the company is talking about your romance that never starts, you never taking the initiative. You are ridiculous, Charles; ridiculous and stupid.

- If anyone is saying anything in the company, it is because you started this wicked rumor. And know that, believe it or not, what Barbra and I have is a great and sincere friendship. There have never been other interests between us. Don’t you dare bring it up again.

Pablo just laughs. They say that in dreams people shed their masks and show who they truly are. There is no falsehood, no theater. He knew how to irritate Charles and did so, with great pleasure. On the other hand Charles was becoming increasingly nervous about his coworker dishonesty and insinuations. Bourbon was usually a calm person, but when he came to the state of wrath it was hard to control his reactions.

- Get lost, Pablo. Get out of here! I ran out of patience with you. A person with such character, with this lack of ethics, doesn’t deserve one second of my time - Charles yelled, pushing his opponent with his hands.

- Who are you to say what I should do or whether or not I should stay here? You're nobody, Charles. Put yourself in your place. You are almost thirty and what have you conquered so far? Nothing! So, first of all, win any battle in life and then come talk to me, asshole.

The vulture watched the scene carefully from the top of the tree. By this time Pablo found himself beside the stone while Charles was a bit behind. In the old sharp rock there was a man whose presence wasn’t noticed by either of them. It wasn’t possible to state his age, but he appeared about fifty years old. The hair was gray with almost all of it already white. His facial expression was hard, like someone without a sense of humor or whose life wasn’t easy. He was wearing sunglasses and a black overcoat that covered the same colored pants and a white shirt.

This man removed his glasses and put them in the jacket. His eyes were completely white as two extremely rare agates. He pulled from one of the pockets a cigarette and lit it. Took the first draft and let the smoke reach the air making different unstable and random shapes that were dancing loose in the