He had been walking, for how long he didn't know or even how he had gotten to this place but he was here, alone and afraid. The branches of the trees about him seemed to move although he could feel no wind. Occasionally, from the darkness around him, he could hear claws scrabbling on the bare trunks of the trees and more than once he felt as if hundreds of eyes were watching him but when he stopped and looked around, he saw nothing.
It was a night darker and longer than he had ever known in his life. Time seemed to have no meaning but he was sure that hours had passed and the moon had barely moved in the sky. He shuddered to think of that moon. The pale, leprous light it cast on the world about him washed away any color and painted everything a bleak shade of grey. He glanced at it again and it still hung in the same place as before, looking like a bloated corpse that had been underwater for too long. He tore his gaze away before he knew it would start to writhe and change before his eyes. He knew that he could not look at it again. He must not look at it again.
The dark grass beneath his bare feet seemed to slither and slide as he walked across it. More than once he felt it winding it's way around his toes, trying to trip him or hold him fast. Occasionally it almost seemed to bite at his ankles. A quick glace down showed shallow cuts were black blood oozed forth. The trees moved. Long cruel branches, bare of both bark and leaves writhed and twisted as he passed. They called to him, whispered in his ears and told him of secrets he didn't want to know. If he stopped to listen, to try to make out what they were saying he knew he would be lost and therein lay madness so he continued to walk.
Beneath the sickly moonlight, dark shapes moved out of the corners of his eyes. Leathery wings beat the air above his head filling the night and his nose with the smell of corruption. Serpentine shapes slipped between the trees, the grass rustling slightly as they did. And yet he continued to walk unknowing of his destination but knowing that he had to get away from all this.
From all around him came a low moan as if the ground itself was crying out. It grew louder and louder until even the trees and the creatures hiding between them had stopped in fear. He needed to get away, he wanted to run but there was no sanctuary until he saw a light in the distance. It burned his eyes but it was the most welcoming thing he had seen so far and without wanting to he started to run towards it.
He felt like he was moving slowly, every step was like he moving through molasses but the light before him drew him like a moth to a flame. The light promised safety and warmth and protection. There were sounds of chase all around him but he dared not look behind him. He saw the light was coming from a radiant figure . A woman by the look of her. Was she an angel? She appeared to have wings and a dress that flowed behind her.
He tried to call out to her but in this place he had no voice. He ran faster and faster. The ground cut and tore at his bare feet but he ignored the pain. The creatures chasing him were so close. He needed to reach her before they did. Blood pounding in his ears, the sound of claws and hooves tearing at the ground, the fetid stench of his pursuers almost choking him and still he ran until he finally stepped into to the light and the pursuit stopped.
He dropped to his knees, the angel with her back still to him slowly turned only to reveal a face from the deepest and darkest of his nightmares. She cried out in an unearthly voice and she and the creatures fell upon him and started to tear at his flesh.
With a scream he woke up, shaking, sweating and aware that in his terror he had managed once again to piss the bed. There was no way he'd get to sleep tonight so with practiced ease he stripped the bed of it's wet sheets, threw them in the wash and went to take a shower.
Later, when he had finished the shower and was sipping a cup of coffee he cursed his life and more importantly that damned nightmare that had followed him since he had been a child. The same dream had tormented him for years. Sometimes it came every week, sometimes it would be months before he'd get it but every time he thought it was gone forever it would appear again with a vengeance and haunt him night after night. Psychiatrists didn't help. Sleeping pills didn't help. Nothing he did seemed to work. It was still as vivid and real as it had been when he was just a kid.
The dream was always the same although sometimes some small details were different. He was always walking through the haunted woods, would see the light, and then finally the glowing demon thing would attack. For a while he thought that maybe the nightmare meant something but nothing ever really changed and it had been over ten years since it started. If anything was supposed to happen it should have happened already.
His mother came downstairs at 6am to see him already in the kitchen looking like he hadn't slept. "You had the nightmare again?" she asked.
He just nodded listlessly. She came over and gave him a hug and wished she was able to do something to help him but nothing she had ever done had helped. The doctors had said that eventually he'd grow out of it but it had been going on since he was just a little boy and showed no sign of letting up.
"I'm okay Mom, " he lied. He wanted nothing more to put her at ease but they both knew that they were powerless to do anything. Eventually he had to get ready to go to school.
As usual, classes were boring and more than once he felt himself starting to drift off but the cold fear of the nightmare always brought him back awake with a start. As it had just started again after a couple of months he knew that the next time he fell asleep it would return. Sleep right now was the enemy but eventually it would win.
After lunch, the rest of the day seemed to pass in a haze and he was barely aware of what was going on although he did manage to make it through the day without causing any problems.
Later on, when he was doing his homework, he lay his head down on the desk just for a moment and within seconds he was fast asleep.
He had been walking, for how long he didn't know or even how he had gotten to this place but he was here, alone and afraid. The branches of the trees about him seemed to move although he could feel no wind. Occasionally, from the darkness around him, he could hear claws scrabbling on the bare trunks of the trees and more than once he felt as if hundreds of eyes were watching him but when he stopped and looked around, he saw nothing.
It was a night darker and colder than he had ever known in his life. Time seemed to have no meaning but he was sure that hours had passed and the moon had barely moved in the sky. He shuddered to think of that moon. The pale, leprous light it cast on the world about him washed away any color and painted everything in bleak shades of black and white. He glanced at it again and it still hung in the same place as before, looking like the colour of rotting meat. The moon seemed to ripple before his eyes and he tore his gaze away before he knew it would pulse like a weak heartbeat and continued to walk. He knew that he could not look at it again. He must not look at it again. But hold on something was different about it... he turned and looked at the moon but it wasn't the same cancerous thing he had seen earlier. It looked bright and serene and had the image of a unicorn on it?
He looked around and noticed that while the forest was dark, there were leaves on the trees and actual forest sounds. He took a deep breath and smelled the damp earth and slightly musty smell that only came from a normal, everyday forest. The vestiges of the nightmare seemed to disappear but was he still dreaming or not?
Feathered wings flapped behind him and he heard something land and he froze in fear. "Be not afraid young one, We are here to help." He turned to see what it was and was surprised to find a anthropomorphic horse lady with wings and a horn standing there with a smile. "Our name is Princess Luna of Canterlot and We are here to protect you from the nightmares that consume you. Sleep and We shall make sure that no harm comes to you".
Chris felt a strange feeling of peace and reassurance and the dream slowly vanished. In the real world he relaxed and settled down for a much needed rest while in another universe, Princess Luna kept an eye on him and more importantly for whatever it was that had been tormenting him for most of his life.
Author's Note
Dammit, the author's notes got nuked the first time around.
Okay, just another of those ideas that's been floating around in my noggin for a while. The sex tag is included for something planned for a future chapter but there will be no clop. Strangely enough this grew from an idea of a human and Luna getting it on in the dream world and only in the dream world.
The whole idea here is Luna and Chris meeting in his dreams, getting along that way but never actually meeting in real life.
