The Phanastasio's Journal

ThePhanastasio · 04-09-2013, 11:58 PM

Not as simple as it seems, mate. It's not just music, but it's things I'm working on as well. Odds are, they're ****. Odds are, I'm ****. But I'm working on them all the same.

Spoiler for The Wonderful Strange Ones - Part One:

And then:

Spoiler for THE WONDERFUL STRANGE ONES - PART TWO:

Spoiler for The Wonderful Strange Ones - Part Three:

**Scarlett O'Hara** · 04-10-2013, 02:25 AM

Lol, I fixed your tags for you.

Trollheart · 04-10-2013, 08:56 AM

This is just excellent, Phant! I am so hooked on this. Please don't leave us hanging too long ... uh, what was that, just outside the range of my sight? Oh no!

ThePhanastasio · 04-12-2013, 12:01 AM

The Wonderful Strange Ones - Part Four
[spoiler]As Jake had promised, the two of them polished off all 18 beers in no time at all, managed to stumble to and from the convenience store without being charged with public drunkenness, and no mention of The Wonderful Strange Ones had passed between them. Although they’d not mentioned them, they still remained, unspoken between the two. They hovered, a hazy cloud of unmentionable and unfathomable dread, a shared dream that was slowly but surely condensing into their waking life.

Jake slurred at one point, “This is how it’s always gonna be…just best buds, getting hammered, hanging out, having a good time,” but they both knew deep down that wasn’t the case. Something had already changed, although nothing had soured their friendship. Their lives had already been moved in some unforeseen direction, both of them being hurtled towards some uncertain conclusion that was both wonderful and strange. That they were being propelled in the same direction was more than most people could hope for; when the roots are digging in for some monumental change in life, most people find themselves scared, doubtful, and very alone. That they had someone to share this great unknown with was a blessing beyond words.

Much later in the evening, Jake crashed out on the couch with a Grateful Dead throw tossed over him, Ned lying in bed and trying to tune out Jake’s incessant drunken snoring, there was another incident.

This one was so small Ned wasn’t so sure whether or not it was an incident, or something easily attributed to his being really drunk and tired.

Jake had fallen asleep with Netflix open on Ned’s Wii, having felt that he would not be able to continue with his life without watching Rocky 3. As Ned tried to drift off, he heard the clicks of someone scrolling through the queue and thought Jake had awakened and decided to watch something else. He started to sit up, before realizing Jake was still snoring, still very much asleep.

Cautiously, he opened one eye, saw a brief shimmer, then the clicking stopped. He closed his eyes quickly, trying to breathe evenly and feign sleep, and the clicking didn’t return. He listened for it for what seemed like hours, but finally managed to fall asleep.

That night, if The Wonderful Strange Ones visited him in his dreams, he was too drunk to remember.

When he awoke in the morning, Jake was already gone. Probably off to take a shower before class – which, Ned realized with dread, he also had today, and in less than an hour. Deciding to forego the shower, he wet his hair in the sink before drying it with a towel and quickly scrubbed his pits and other areas which pretty much needed a good scrubbing before venturing into public.

He popped a couple of Ibuprofen in hopes that they would silence the protests of his very offended body who chose this opportunity to ache in ways only a hangover can elicit, and headed out the door.

Class was completely horrible. His headache, it turned out, was not something a few Ibuprofen could remedy, and even Gatorade didn’t seem to make him feel much better. As his professor droned on about microbes in society, his mind drifted to his first dream about The Wonderful Strange Ones, the man in the car, and The Giant.

The giant was certainly corporeal, he thought, in the broadest sense of the term. The feeling, however, that he’d been seeing two completely different moments at the same time obscured the figure in his mind. He fancied that if he’d seen the figure walk under the street lamp, it would have disappeared in a wisp of smoke, a shimmering dissolution.

Leaving class, he attempted to push the thoughts from his mind, worrying that somehow, thinking about them might give them some sort of power. He didn’t know how they worked. He remembered The Stranger sincerely wishing him luck in figuring this out, the strangeness of them, and figured he’d be forever in the dark.

Pulling his phone out for something to distract him and pull him into the real world, he saw a missed call from Jake and a few texts. Opening his inbox, he read over the messages Jake had sent him.

Hey man – Sorry I jetted early. Had another dream about them.

Hey…guess you’re still in class. Down to hang?

Seriously man, call me. Let’s hang. I want to talk about this.

Really unsure of what to do – it did seem like talking about this was what started this latest mess – he finally decided it couldn’t do any further damage.

When he arrived at Jake’s, the familiar sweet aroma of pot greeted him at the door, and Jake invited him to sit down and partake. They talked about the typical bull**** – school, music, and how good Jake’s weed was – before Jake finally put the bowl down on the table.

“Now. We going to talk about the elephant in the room?”

“Guess I don’t have a choice, yeah?” Ned smiled weakly.

“We’ve gotta talk about it, man. If we don’t, it’s going to drive us insane.” Jake shook a cigarette out of his pack, lit it, thought a moment and then went to the fridge and grabbed a six pack of Thirsty Dog. Tossing one to Ned and opening one for himself, he continued, “Might as well. You know. May make it easier to talk about.”

Ned just nodded and popped his beer open with a lighter he grabbed off of Jake’s glass coffee table – which was in dire need of some Windex. There was a few seconds of silence before Ned looked up at Jake who seemed completely at a loss for words. “What was the dream about? Maybe we can figure something out.”

“Yeah, I’m not so sure about that.” Jake laughed nervously.
[/spoiler]

The Wonderful Strange Ones - Part Five
[spoiler]Jake had been on this soccer field before, but never this late at night, and certainly never alone. He’d played here as a kid, was actually pretty good, but never stuck with it. Now, he was trying to figure out why he’d come here – and, more importantly, how.

It was fall, nights beginning to get a little brisk, and there was dew on the grass which soaked the bottom of his jeans. Goose pimples rose on his flesh, and he wondered why he’d not thought to grab a hoodie when he had, apparently, decided to come here.

He felt his cigarettes in his pocket, and decided to make his way to the bleachers to sit and have a smoke before he decided to say **** this place and head back to the warmth and comfort of his apartment. As he made his way over to the bleachers, he realized that he wasn’t alone, saw someone sitting up at the top in the shadows. Tensing and taking a step back, he saw The Stranger rise to his feet.

Just as he was about to take off and get the Hell out of there, the man on the bleachers spoke from the shadows. “Jacob, it’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you. I’m Ned’s friend.”

“Who are you?” Jake asked immediately, frozen between running anyway and abject horror at this stranger knowing his name.

“I’m nobody,” The Stranger said, moving down the bleachers towards Jake, “It’s not important.”

“Thought you said you were Ned’s friend,” Jake addressed the figure, uneasily, voice tight.

The figure stopped moving a moment, and from one of the lights illuminating the pitch, Jake could see the man better, felt as though he’d seen him before, in a dream maybe.

“I am his friend,” the man replied, a hint of amusement in his voice, “In a way. And yours, too.”

“Why are you here?” Jake asked, then going with a better question, “Why am I here?”

“There’s something you need to see,” the man said simply, then before Jake could respond, “Now quiet, or they’ll know you’re here.” The Stranger motioned for Jake to sit down, which he did, grudgingly, then The Stranger took a seat next to Jake. The two looked out across the field in silence.

After they’d been watching for what seemed to be forever, Jake turned to the man, said, “I don’t see what—“ before being shushed by a wave of the hand.

“Here they come,” the man whispered, eyes alight with wonderment, and Jake looked out across the field.

It looked like they were rolling head over heels, perpetual somersaulting, but Jake wasn’t even quite certain they were touching the ground – or that they had heads or heels as it were. To gaze at them gave him a headache, and he wanted to look away, but couldn’t bring himself to do so.

“Why, they’re babies,” Jake murmured in wonderment, and The Stranger nodded his head.

“They’re safe. Or, as safe as they get. They won’t even notice if you look at them. They’re just playing. It’s safe to watch. They won’t hurt you.”

“Would some of them actually hurt you?” Jake asked, and The Stranger winced.

“They try. Sometimes they do. Some are worse than others.”

“What are they?” Jake wondered aloud, watching the rolling beings near the opposite goal, just out of the light.

“The Wonderful Strange Ones,” The Stranger told him quietly, “And that’s all you need to know, I guess. That’s all I know.”

“But there are different kinds, yeah? The giant, and---“

“Don’t say that name!” The Stranger blurted out, eyes alight with fear and anger, “Don’t you know not to say that name?”

Taken aback, Jake tried to apologize. “No, I…Sorry, I didn’t know that you couldn’t say that. I didn’t know that it wasn’t all right.”

“Sorry doesn’t help anything if he comes now, does it?”

“What?” Jake was terrified, his heart racing. He had certainly not meant to summon any of these creatures, definitely not the one called The Giant. His thoughts raced wildly, as he knew he was dreaming, but he knew that the distinction between dreaming and reality in these instances was a very thin one. This was almost as real as any reality; almost. They were leaking through.

“There are certain things,” the man told him, a tone of annoyance apparent in his voice, “We shouldn’t say.”

“I didn’t know that, though!” Jake almost yelled at him, embarrassed, scared, and frustrated with the whole situation. “How in the **** was I supposed to know that? No one told me, and you’re too busy being vague!”

“Real nice, friend,” the man shot at Jake, eyes narrowed, “One person who can kind of empathize with the horror you’re probably experiencing, and you completely cut him down. Well done.”

“Well,” Jake lit a cigarette, trying to look calmer than he was feeling right now, “To be fair, you do have to admit you’re being a little bit vague. No? Ned thought so, too.”

“Ned,” The Stranger told him, clearly a little bit miffed, “didn’t really have much of an opportunity to speak, and I just told him what I thought he wanted to know. I’m sure if he’d had the opportunity, he’d not have been quite this rude.”

“All right, I get it,” Jake laughed nervously, “I’ve got your panties in a bunch or whatever. Point taken. I just want to know what in the Hell is going on.”

The Stranger opened his mouth to respond, but there was suddenly a sound of something heavy grating on metal. Before Jake could turn around, The Stranger seized his shoulders, keeping him facing straight out at the soccer field.

“You’re going to want to wake up now,” the man whispered to him, desperation and terror in his voice, “Immediately.”

“How?” Jake asked, complete panic overtaking him, “How do I wake up?”

“You’ve got to trust me, Jake. Just wake up, right now. I’ll have to deal with this, but you’ve still got a way out, trust me. I don’t. Just wake up.”

The grating noise came again, and then there was nothing.[/spoiler]

**Scarlett O'Hara** · 04-12-2013, 09:04 AM

Erm...you keep forgetting parts of the tags for the spoiler tags.

Stephen · 06-27-2013, 06:07 PM

How's part 6 coming along?

No pressure, I just enjoyed the first 5.

Paedantic Basterd · 06-27-2013, 09:07 PM

Spoiler tags need a tagline: [ spoiler=if you put a bandaid on it nobody will know it's a goat]IT'S A GOAT[/spoiler]

Space removed after the first bracket, of course

04-09-2013, 11:58 PM	#1 (permalink)
ThePhanastasio Killed Laura Palmer Join Date: Sep 2010 Location: Ashland, KY Posts: 1,679	The Phanastasio's Journal Not as simple as it seems, mate. It's not just music, but it's things I'm working on as well. Odds are, they're **. Odds are, I'm . But I'm working on them all the same. Spoiler** for The Wonderful Strange Ones - Part One: They were starting to leak through. It was all making some sort of terrible sense now: They’d been getting closer every time he dreamt them, and he was letting them. Of course they were going to find a way through. Of course. He knew this with complete confidence, was, in fact, more sure of this than of anything he’d ever known. But why me? Ned wondered mournfully to himself, Why does it have to be me? He thought of the incidents over the past week: The shimmer he caught out the corner of his eye while he had his lunch on the park bench overseeing the sprawling soccer pitch; the dark figure he’d spied while driving down a country road; and, this morning, the reflection of movement behind him he’d observed on the reflective surface of his television screen. He also knew with absolute certainty that he could never, ever acknowledge them or something bad would happen. They couldn’t know that he was aware that they’d leaked through, and that would make them stronger than he could imagine. As shadows -- as flickers, reflections – they were manageable, and they were, for all intents and purposes, safe. No, not safe. He couldn’t allow himself to be lulled into a false sense of security. They were weak. Making sure that they remained weak was priority number one. After this morning’s incident, he figured he’d pinpointed the exact moment he’d allowed them to cross over into waking life; it was at his friend, Jake’s apartment four days previous he’d made the awful mistake. Jake was the consummate nu-age hippie, replete with tie-dye, mind-altering substances, and an anti-government protest-related arrest record. He lived in a fairly sizeable apartment in the nice part of town to match his fairly sizeable trust fund, and his presence in this part of town was a cause for self-righteous disdain amongst the more upstanding citizens in the neighborhood. In contrast, Ned was a t-shirt/hoodie kind of guy, whose clothes always looked nice and well kept, if casual. He’d never so much as gotten a speeding ticket, and lived in an efficiency apartment near campus where he still called to talk to his mom on the phone every single day without fail. Naturally, Ned thought Jake was the coolest mother**er he knew, and they’d been best friends since high school, when Ned came across Jake smoking pot while on a school trip to Lake Vesuvius sophomore year and took his first hit of the reefer from the poorly rolled joint of completely weed. On the afternoon in question, Ned had gone for a bike ride, decided he wasn’t stoned enough to embark on said bike ride, and texted Jake to see if they could chill and smoke some trees. Jake was only too happy to oblige. “I’ve been having this crazy sex dreams,” Jake told him, leaning back on his pea green 1970s era couch and taking a hit off of the bowl before passing it over to Ned, “It’s like, I wake up with a ing boner everyday now. I think I need to get laid.” “What about Maggie?” A deep inhale of smoke. Release. Pass. “What about her?” “Don’t you guys still like crazy?” Ned waved the bowl off when Jake reached it over to him, “I’m good.” “Suit yourself, man. And hell no, we don’t. I’m thinking about breaking it off with her. Finding some strange.” They both laughed, but the word “strange” elicited a, well, strange response from Ned, who suddenly remembered something. “Speaking of strange,” he said, definitely feeling every bit of the dank he’d just smoked, “I’ve had some strange dreams.” “Yeah? Dreamed you actually had some balls?” “ you, man. No. Like, recurring nightmare .” “Dude,” Jake put the bowl down on the table and smiled in his cheesy Jake way, “If this is another faceless dog incident…” “It’s not! And that dream was awful, by the way. What’s your problem with my faceless dog dream?” Jake put his hands up, a forfeit, “Nothing, man, I was just saying that you got all kinds of worked up over that dream.” “This is nothing like the faceless dog dream.” Ned felt a little embarrassed he’d brought it up now, fiddled with some change in his pocket and looked away from Jake, who was regarding him with stoned interest. “Just nevermind. Forget I mentioned it.” “Why’re you getting so defensive, man? I was messing with you. What’s up?” “No,” Ned said, feeling his ears burning with humiliation, “Just don’t worry about it.” “Dude,” Jake said, and when Ned still wouldn’t look at him, he said more emphatically, “Dude, seriously. What is up with this dream?” Still a little shell-shocked from his earlier reaction, Ned shrugged, “It’s just weird is all. I keep having it, but this time it’s like a theme moreso than the same dream. I don’t know. It’s just made me wake up feeling all weird.” “Yeah?” Jake replied, and when Ned made no move to elaborate, “So what’s it about? Like, what’s the theme?” “Just these weird things that are in just, normal life. Like these beings, I guess? I don’t know. There was some guy in the first dream, and when I saw the first one, he was like, ‘Oh, you see them, too? Don’t let them know you see them.’ And he called them The Wonderful Strange Ones. That was kind of weird. But they keep popping up.” “What, like aliens?” “No. Like, he said that everyone can see them, but most people choose not to see them, whatever the that means.” “Huh. Is this dude in all of the dreams?” Jake was clearly interested now. When he lit a cigarette, his eyes didn’t move from Ned’s face. “No. Just the first one. Just to let me know what they were I guess? I don’t know. Anyway, it’s like, they just pop up in normal dreams, but I know I’m not supposed to acknowledge they’re, you know, there. I just have to ignore them, but they’re always watching. One time, one of them caught me looking at them, and the next dream, they were there again, but they were closer. I had to make a real effort not to look at them.” “Oh!” Jake said, hopping up from the couch as if having a significant revelation, “So, they’re like lucid dreams?” “No. That’s one of the things that’s bothering me. It’s like, I’m dreaming in the same consciousness or whatever, don’t know I’m dreaming, but I always know about them now. I always know they’re around and not to look at them.” “That’s ed up, dude,” Jake grinned. “Tell me about it.” Following that afternoon, there had been at least one incident each day. Prior to that afternoon, there’d not been a single incident. As Ned tried to watch TV and not look into the reflection at the upper right corner for another sign they’d made it through, his cell phone rang. It was Jake. “Hey man, what’s up?” he answered, and scarcely recognized the troubled voice which replied on the phone as Jake’s. “Dude, we need to talk. Immediately. Can I come over?” “Yeah, man,” Ned leaned back on his futon, brow furrowed in confusion, “What’s up?” “We’ll talk when I get there, man. I’ve got to talk to someone.” “. Is it Maggie?” “What? No, Ned, it’s not Maggie. It’s…I’ll talk to you when I get there. Later.” “Later, dude.” The phone clicked in his ear. He had no idea what in the world Jake was so upset about and tried to go over the possibilities: Had someone narced him out? Had he been kicked out of his grad school program? Had he taken some really gnarly acid and needed a familiar set and setting to ride it out? With Jake, there was really no telling what was up, so Ned set about tidying up his apartment so that his friend didn’t have to hang out in utter filth. Especially if he was tripping. That wouldn’t be good. Ultimately deciding it was definitely a trip gone awry, Ned hooked his laptop up to the speakers and started playing The Grateful Dead’s American Beauty album. Jake would definitely make him restart it once he arrived, but it would definitely mellow him out in the mean time. When he heard the knock on the door, he opened it to find an extremely frantic Jake behind it. Jake pushed past him inside, and Ned offered to start the album over again. “No, Ned, I’m not high. I haven’t even smoked today, okay?” This was a huge shock. Jake was the wake and bake type, and since it was around 5pm, even Jake would have been up for a few hours. Suddenly, it dawned on Ned. “Oh, I’m sorry. You’re out, right? I can call Matt, and he’ll hook us up,” but Jake waved him off, still frantic. “No, this isn’t about weed. I need to be clear to think about this, to talk about this. I don’t know what you did, man, but I want some ing answers.” “Wait, no, what? What I did?” Jake plopped down on the futon, and averted his gaze, “What did I do?” “You told me about those…those…Wonderful Strange Ones or whatever. And now they’re not leaving ME alone.” Ned’s heart seemed to stop. He mouthed words but no sound came out. Finally, he leaned on the arm of the futon and tried to calm Jake, to rationalize what was going on. “No, man, it’s just the power of suggestion. You thought my dream sounded weird, so you started having a similar dream. That’s all it is.” “They shimmer, man. They shimmer. Some of them shimmer, don’t they?” “Yeah? Well, I mean, I probably mentioned that when I was over at your place.” “No, you didn’t.” Ned was finding it hard to swallow, even harder to understand what was actually going on. It really seemed like this was going far beyond anything in his experience, and he tried to assure Jake once again, “I mean, I’m sure I told you. We were pretty stoned.” “Yeah, we were,” Jake shot back, “But you didn’t tell me they shimmered until you told me in my dream. And you definitely never mentioned The Giant.” And then: Spoiler** for THE WONDERFUL STRANGE ONES - PART TWO: It was darker than any night has possibly been, could possibly be, and there wasn’t a single other car on the road. In the front seat were Jake and Maggie, talking back and forth about nothing in particular, or at least nothing Ned could really discern; he was occupied listening to the music coming through the speakers, wrapping him in warmth, comfort, and complete, contented bliss. This felt like a perfect moment. Beside him, a man he’d never met, a man with immaculate dark hair, a clean, pressed dress shirt and tie, and an intelligent if intense gaze. Currently, this stranger’s gaze was fixed out the window, behind Ned, and Ned found himself turning as well, to see just what this man was so interested in. He didn’t see anything – at first. Then, as they stopped at a stop sign and Jake lingered a little longer than he should have, fumbling with the CDs on his visor to change the music, Ned saw movement on the side street. At first, he took it simply as a person walking down the street. As his eyes adjusted, however, he saw that this figure was bigger than you could imagine, a wondrous, inhuman height and branch-like limbs hanging from hunched, wide shoulders. The figure seemed to move in jerks, and he seemed hunched with the task of pulling something behind him, something heavy. This something appeared to be an immense army knapsack, the figure moving slowly, jarringly forward. Ned was trying to make a concerted effort to take in the scene, to make sense of what his eyes were seeing, but it wasn’t registering, for whatever reason, just wasn’t something he could make sense of. It felt like a hallucination, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it, and for a moment the thought, “It feels like trying to see someone else’s hallucination,” but that fell quickly from his mind as he continued trying to understand the vision making its way down the street. It was there, but it couldn’t possibly be; how could it be? There was something wrong about it, something that filled him with such awe that he wasn’t sure if he was terrified or amazed. Just as this confusing vision was walking beneath a street lamp, the car was moving again, and he craned his neck to try to get a look through the rear window, but it was gone. He turned back around, feeling odd, and saw Jake and Maggie still obliviously conversing in the front of the vehicle. He looked now to The Stranger, whose gaze was fixed now on Ned’s face, an amused sparkle in his dark eyes. Ned opened his mouth now to speak, but The Stranger shook his head tilted his head in the general direction of Jake and Maggie, and then a smile played on his lips. “You see them, too?” The Stranger asked, his voice warm and rich, a cup of hot chocolate on a winter’s day. Ned simply nodded, not knowing what else he could do, and a question formed on his lips before The Stranger shook his head again. “Don’t disturb them,” he smiled, “This isn’t the time.” “Who are they?” The Stranger inquired, looking for Ned’s assertion that this had been the question he was asking, and Ned nodded briskly. “Easy,” The Stranger laughed, before continuing, “They’re called The Wonderful Strange Ones, and they must never know you see them. Everyone can see them. Not everyone does see them.” This left Ned nearly as confused as ever, although the name overwhelmed his mind with vivid, dark, and beautiful things, secret things, things you never spoke aloud but that he held inside, in your most secret place. The things you feared and loved in the same instant, the things that couldn’t be, wouldn’t be, could never be. Lost dreams, fragments of long-forgotten thoughts; that place inside your fantasy world full of strangeness so wonderful, so beautiful, that it could bring tears to your eyes. “Look,” The Stranger gleefully observed, pointing out the window behind Ned. He turned and saw movement in the tall grass beside the road, barely perceptible shimmering, and small, vaguely human shapes frolicking amongst the blades. Filled with wonder, Ned watched them, wide-eyed, before The Stranger quickly grabbed him and wheeled him back around. “They can never see you looking at them,” he explained, “Or they’ll leak through. I don’t know how they do it, but they leak through. God help you if they do. God help us all.” “You keep saying that.” Ned remarked, looking back to the window, before feeling a hand close over his mouth. “Hush,” the man hissed, “Do you really want your friends to get wrapped up in this, too? Do you really want to be responsible for that?” When Ned made no response, The Stranger continued, “You’re thinking that just because you’re dreaming this doesn’t matter, right? You’re thinking that just because you’re dreaming that it’s safe?” Ned still remained silent, unresponsive, but he felt tears burning in his eyes. “Look,” the man demanded again, directing Ned’s attention once more out the window and into the night, where he almost saw colors flying together, almost human shaped and then morphing into something that was beyond seeing, something that was like looking through a window and seeing yesterday and today at the same time. The feeling he got from looking at these beings made him feel incredibly small and incredibly insignificant, and he closed his eyes tightly, hoping to block it out. Finally, the hand moved from his mouth, and he turned once again to The Stranger, face now full of unfathomable sorrow, eyes dark with despair. “I am sorry, friend, truly I am,” the man said in a low voice choked with pity and deep emotion, tears now filling the eyes, “It is a burden. And they are beyond anything you can understand. I hope one day you can understand them, because I never could, and I never will. I just know that I am afraid.” The Stranger’s chin quivered, a tear spilled over, and he self-consciously brushed it away before seizing Ned’s shoulders. “Please, I am begging you. Don’t let them leak over. They’re already dangerous enough here, but they’re weak. If they know you see them, that gives them power,” the man now set his jaw, bore his gaze directly into Ned’s eyes, took a deep, resolved breath, “And they will never leave you, as long as you live, or after. They will still haunt you after.” With that, the man slowly released his hold on Ned, smiled wryly, and vanished as though he had never been there in the first place. Spoiler for The Wonderful Strange Ones - Part Three: “I’m sorry,” Ned told Jake, plopping down next to his friend on the couch, “I really don’t know what to say. I thought it was a weird dream.” Jake regarded him a moment, before turning away, shaking his head and rubbing the stubble on his chin absently, “No you didn’t, man. You knew it was more than a dream. You just needed someone to validate it.” “That’s not it at all, that’s…” Ned started, before being cut off with a wave of Jake’s hand. “No, it’s fine…well, it’s not really fine. It’s all kinds of **ed up, to be perfectly honest,” Ned opened his mouth to apologize, but Jake continued, “But I would have done the exact same goddamn thing. How are you supposed to keep that to yourself?” “I was just afraid I was going crazy.” “Yeah? Well if you are, then I’m right there on the crazy train with you.” Ned groaned, “Please don’t ever reference Ozzy Osbourne in my apartment again.” “Why? Does it make you…Paranoid?” Ned laughed, the tension broken, “Nice try. That’s Sabbath, and that’s all right.” “Anyway, man,” Jake grinned, “I think we should get mad drunk and try to forget about these ing things, The Wonderful Strange Ones or whatever the **.” Ned hopped up, moving to his refrigerator, “Agreed, dude. Magic Hat?” “Number 9?” Ned looked over his beer selection, thoughts kind of in some semblance of order for the time being, “Yeah, or Circus Boy.” “Both. We are drinking every single beer in your fridge, and then we are stumbling drunkenly to Speedway and buying more. And then we are drinking all of that beer.” Ned smiled, grabbed two six packs from the refrigerator, and moved back to the couch. “I’ve got three six packs, man. That’s plenty of beer, don’t ya think?” Jake turned to him, smiling a tremendous, wide Jake grin. “But…’I Don’t Wanna Stop’!” he exclaimed, and Ned glared at him in mock fury. “I’m going to have to kill you.” __________________ Phish: Studio Discography Reviewed 100 Albums I Heartily Recommend My last.fm It's a hand-me-down, the thoughts are broken Perhaps they're better left unsung

04-10-2013, 02:25 AM	#2 (permalink)
Scarlett O'Hara Make it so Join Date: Oct 2005 Posts: 6,181	Lol, I fixed your tags for you. __________________ "Elph is truly an enfant terrible of the forum, bless and curse him" - Marie, Queen of Thots

04-10-2013, 08:56 AM	#3 (permalink)
Trollheart Born to be mild Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: 404 Not Found Posts: 26,992	This is just excellent, Phant! I am so hooked on this. Please don't leave us hanging too long ... uh, what was that, just outside the range of my sight? Oh no! __________________ Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

04-12-2013, 12:01 AM	#4 (permalink)
ThePhanastasio Killed Laura Palmer Join Date: Sep 2010 Location: Ashland, KY Posts: 1,679	The Wonderful Strange Ones - Part Four [spoiler]As Jake had promised, the two of them polished off all 18 beers in no time at all, managed to stumble to and from the convenience store without being charged with public drunkenness, and no mention of The Wonderful Strange Ones had passed between them. Although they’d not mentioned them, they still remained, unspoken between the two. They hovered, a hazy cloud of unmentionable and unfathomable dread, a shared dream that was slowly but surely condensing into their waking life. Jake slurred at one point, “This is how it’s always gonna be…just best buds, getting hammered, hanging out, having a good time,” but they both knew deep down that wasn’t the case. Something had already changed, although nothing had soured their friendship. Their lives had already been moved in some unforeseen direction, both of them being hurtled towards some uncertain conclusion that was both wonderful and strange. That they were being propelled in the same direction was more than most people could hope for; when the roots are digging in for some monumental change in life, most people find themselves scared, doubtful, and very alone. That they had someone to share this great unknown with was a blessing beyond words. Much later in the evening, Jake crashed out on the couch with a Grateful Dead throw tossed over him, Ned lying in bed and trying to tune out Jake’s incessant drunken snoring, there was another incident. This one was so small Ned wasn’t so sure whether or not it was an incident, or something easily attributed to his being really drunk and tired. Jake had fallen asleep with Netflix open on Ned’s Wii, having felt that he would not be able to continue with his life without watching Rocky 3. As Ned tried to drift off, he heard the clicks of someone scrolling through the queue and thought Jake had awakened and decided to watch something else. He started to sit up, before realizing Jake was still snoring, still very much asleep. Cautiously, he opened one eye, saw a brief shimmer, then the clicking stopped. He closed his eyes quickly, trying to breathe evenly and feign sleep, and the clicking didn’t return. He listened for it for what seemed like hours, but finally managed to fall asleep. That night, if The Wonderful Strange Ones visited him in his dreams, he was too drunk to remember. When he awoke in the morning, Jake was already gone. Probably off to take a shower before class – which, Ned realized with dread, he also had today, and in less than an hour. Deciding to forego the shower, he wet his hair in the sink before drying it with a towel and quickly scrubbed his pits and other areas which pretty much needed a good scrubbing before venturing into public. He popped a couple of Ibuprofen in hopes that they would silence the protests of his very offended body who chose this opportunity to ache in ways only a hangover can elicit, and headed out the door. Class was completely horrible. His headache, it turned out, was not something a few Ibuprofen could remedy, and even Gatorade didn’t seem to make him feel much better. As his professor droned on about microbes in society, his mind drifted to his first dream about The Wonderful Strange Ones, the man in the car, and The Giant. The giant was certainly corporeal, he thought, in the broadest sense of the term. The feeling, however, that he’d been seeing two completely different moments at the same time obscured the figure in his mind. He fancied that if he’d seen the figure walk under the street lamp, it would have disappeared in a wisp of smoke, a shimmering dissolution. Leaving class, he attempted to push the thoughts from his mind, worrying that somehow, thinking about them might give them some sort of power. He didn’t know how they worked. He remembered The Stranger sincerely wishing him luck in figuring this out, the strangeness of them, and figured he’d be forever in the dark. Pulling his phone out for something to distract him and pull him into the real world, he saw a missed call from Jake and a few texts. Opening his inbox, he read over the messages Jake had sent him. Hey man – Sorry I jetted early. Had another dream about them. Hey…guess you’re still in class. Down to hang? Seriously man, call me. Let’s hang. I want to talk about this. Really unsure of what to do – it did seem like talking about this was what started this latest mess – he finally decided it couldn’t do any further damage. When he arrived at Jake’s, the familiar sweet aroma of pot greeted him at the door, and Jake invited him to sit down and partake. They talked about the typical bull** – school, music, and how good Jake’s weed was – before Jake finally put the bowl down on the table. “Now. We going to talk about the elephant in the room?” “Guess I don’t have a choice, yeah?” Ned smiled weakly. “We’ve gotta talk about it, man. If we don’t, it’s going to drive us insane.” Jake shook a cigarette out of his pack, lit it, thought a moment and then went to the fridge and grabbed a six pack of Thirsty Dog. Tossing one to Ned and opening one for himself, he continued, “Might as well. You know. May make it easier to talk about.” Ned just nodded and popped his beer open with a lighter he grabbed off of Jake’s glass coffee table – which was in dire need of some Windex. There was a few seconds of silence before Ned looked up at Jake who seemed completely at a loss for words. “What was the dream about? Maybe we can figure something out.” “Yeah, I’m not so sure about that.” Jake laughed nervously. [/spoiler] The Wonderful Strange Ones - Part Five [spoiler]Jake had been on this soccer field before, but never this late at night, and certainly never alone. He’d played here as a kid, was actually pretty good, but never stuck with it. Now, he was trying to figure out why he’d come here – and, more importantly, how. It was fall, nights beginning to get a little brisk, and there was dew on the grass which soaked the bottom of his jeans. Goose pimples rose on his flesh, and he wondered why he’d not thought to grab a hoodie when he had, apparently, decided to come here. He felt his cigarettes in his pocket, and decided to make his way to the bleachers to sit and have a smoke before he decided to say this place and head back to the warmth and comfort of his apartment. As he made his way over to the bleachers, he realized that he wasn’t alone, saw someone sitting up at the top in the shadows. Tensing and taking a step back, he saw The Stranger rise to his feet. Just as he was about to take off and get the Hell out of there, the man on the bleachers spoke from the shadows. “Jacob, it’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you. I’m Ned’s friend.” “Who are you?” Jake asked immediately, frozen between running anyway and abject horror at this stranger knowing his name. “I’m nobody,” The Stranger said, moving down the bleachers towards Jake, “It’s not important.” “Thought you said you were Ned’s friend,” Jake addressed the figure, uneasily, voice tight. The figure stopped moving a moment, and from one of the lights illuminating the pitch, Jake could see the man better, felt as though he’d seen him before, in a dream maybe. “I am his friend,” the man replied, a hint of amusement in his voice, “In a way. And yours, too.” “Why are you here?” Jake asked, then going with a better question, “Why am I here?” “There’s something you need to see,” the man said simply, then before Jake could respond, “Now quiet, or they’ll know you’re here.” The Stranger motioned for Jake to sit down, which he did, grudgingly, then The Stranger took a seat next to Jake. The two looked out across the field in silence. After they’d been watching for what seemed to be forever, Jake turned to the man, said, “I don’t see what—“ before being shushed by a wave of the hand. “Here they come,” the man whispered, eyes alight with wonderment, and Jake looked out across the field. It looked like they were rolling head over heels, perpetual somersaulting, but Jake wasn’t even quite certain they were touching the ground – or that they had heads or heels as it were. To gaze at them gave him a headache, and he wanted to look away, but couldn’t bring himself to do so. “Why, they’re babies,” Jake murmured in wonderment, and The Stranger nodded his head. “They’re safe. Or, as safe as they get. They won’t even notice if you look at them. They’re just playing. It’s safe to watch. They won’t hurt you.” “Would some of them actually hurt you?” Jake asked, and The Stranger winced. “They try. Sometimes they do. Some are worse than others.” “What are they?” Jake wondered aloud, watching the rolling beings near the opposite goal, just out of the light. “The Wonderful Strange Ones,” The Stranger told him quietly, “And that’s all you need to know, I guess. That’s all I know.” “But there are different kinds, yeah? The giant, and---“ “Don’t say that name!” The Stranger blurted out, eyes alight with fear and anger, “Don’t you know not to say that name?” Taken aback, Jake tried to apologize. “No, I…Sorry, I didn’t know that you couldn’t say that. I didn’t know that it wasn’t all right.” “Sorry doesn’t help anything if he comes now, does it?” “What?” Jake was terrified, his heart racing. He had certainly not meant to summon any of these creatures, definitely not the one called The Giant. His thoughts raced wildly, as he knew he was dreaming, but he knew that the distinction between dreaming and reality in these instances was a very thin one. This was almost as real as any reality; almost. They were leaking through. “There are certain things,” the man told him, a tone of annoyance apparent in his voice, “We shouldn’t say.” “I didn’t know that, though!” Jake almost yelled at him, embarrassed, scared, and frustrated with the whole situation. “How in the ** was I supposed to know that? No one told me, and you’re too busy being vague!” “Real nice, friend,” the man shot at Jake, eyes narrowed, “One person who can kind of empathize with the horror you’re probably experiencing, and you completely cut him down. Well done.” “Well,” Jake lit a cigarette, trying to look calmer than he was feeling right now, “To be fair, you do have to admit you’re being a little bit vague. No? Ned thought so, too.” “Ned,” The Stranger told him, clearly a little bit miffed, “didn’t really have much of an opportunity to speak, and I just told him what I thought he wanted to know. I’m sure if he’d had the opportunity, he’d not have been quite this rude.” “All right, I get it,” Jake laughed nervously, “I’ve got your panties in a bunch or whatever. Point taken. I just want to know what in the Hell is going on.” The Stranger opened his mouth to respond, but there was suddenly a sound of something heavy grating on metal. Before Jake could turn around, The Stranger seized his shoulders, keeping him facing straight out at the soccer field. “You’re going to want to wake up now,” the man whispered to him, desperation and terror in his voice, “Immediately.” “How?” Jake asked, complete panic overtaking him, “How do I wake up?” “You’ve got to trust me, Jake. Just wake up, right now. I’ll have to deal with this, but you’ve still got a way out, trust me. I don’t. Just wake up.” The grating noise came again, and then there was nothing.[/spoiler] __________________ Phish: Studio Discography Reviewed 100 Albums I Heartily Recommend My last.fm It's a hand-me-down, the thoughts are broken Perhaps they're better left unsung

04-12-2013, 09:04 AM	#5 (permalink)
Scarlett O'Hara Make it so Join Date: Oct 2005 Posts: 6,181	Erm...you keep forgetting parts of the tags for the spoiler tags. __________________ "Elph is truly an enfant terrible of the forum, bless and curse him" - Marie, Queen of Thots

06-27-2013, 06:07 PM	#6 (permalink)
Stephen I sleep in your hat Join Date: Mar 2011 Location: Melbourne, Vic. Aus. Posts: 1,847	How's part 6 coming along? No pressure, I just enjoyed the first 5.

06-27-2013, 09:07 PM	#7 (permalink)
Paedantic Basterd Music Addict Join Date: Sep 2010 Posts: 5,184	Spoiler tags need a tagline: [ spoiler=if you put a bandaid on it nobody will know it's a goat]IT'S A GOAT[/spoiler] Space removed after the first bracket, of course