Dream – Night of 2018-10-15

• Running down a road to go do laps a the park I normally run at in the mornings
• Foggy out and I think how it would make a good photograph the way the fog is flowing through the trees
• I keep running down the trail and start to get worried that nothing looks familiar
• I was carrying something and wanted to put it down on the benches that were normally about half way into this park, but the benches were gone.
• I run past a boat launch that is dilapidated, and then another angled roadway covered in brown slippery mud.  I slide down it as I try to run across. Other people are around now.
• I finally get to a park at the end of a peninsula where there are lots of people, a lighthouse, and the ocean beyond.  A steep set of steps goes down around the base of the lighthouse to the edge of the water.  I run down through here and then up the other side.
• At the top of the other side of the hill I find a place to rent small powered boats, so I get one.
• I drive the boat down canals that are at first empty, but soon get crowded with other boat traffic. Some boats are small like mine, some large.  It’s like a street in India with the mass of cars going every direction.
• I get to an opening where I stop and meet some friends.  Just past where we stopped the waterway opens up into a  large bay which I realize is Newport.
• But it’s getting late and we have to get back.
• I jump on someone else’s smaller boat that’s more like a motorcycle, and she begins riding fast back up the canal through the heavy boat traffic, weaving around other boats and narrowly missing head-on collisions.
• We stop at a large marina and water park where there are more people I know.
• We stay there for a while eating and drinking but I get separated from my group.
• When I can’t find them and I realize it’s almost time to leave, I sneak onto a large boat that docked there.
• Soon after I crouch down on a set of benches on top of the boat, a cover starts coming down over the top.  I am nearly crushed when I see a girl to my right who is operating the controls on this weird fiberglass cover that’s covering the whole top of the boat.  She is right next to me so I don’t understand how she will get out either.
• “I’m sorry, I snuck on and I’d like to get out now, but I’m stuck.” I say.
• “No, you are not,” she says.  “Turn around.”
• I turn and realize that by my feet there is an opening which I go through and she follows.
• I talk with her as the boat makes its way back out into the canal and up through other canals that I didn’t know about.
• It makes its way into a city and we pass bridges, buildings, fields with people playing games.
• Finally the boat stops again and I realize the girl I was talking with is gone.  I look around and see she is down on the bow of the ship which is flooding with water. The entire ship is settling deeper into the water and the bow is going under.
• I run to find someone and point out what’s happening.  I am afraid she’ll drown, or be swept off the ship since the water coming over the railing is so strong.
• I find another, older woman and point out what’s happening.
• “Just watch” she says.
• Two more girls join the girl at the bow.  The ship moves in front of three tubes, they look like the opening to a waterslide, but a strong current of water is entering them, filling them completely with rushing water.
• When the ship is finally in front of them.  The three girls walk up to the tubes, and dive in head first.
• I look around for where the exit of the tubes might be, but I cannot find it.
• I turn to the woman next to me, “Where do they exit?”
• “Back at the start.” is her reply.
• I don’t understand at first and then realize she means the water park where we were docked hours ago.  I think back on how far the ship traveled to get to this spot from there.  It’s miles!  “They will drown!” I say.
• “Perhaps.  They are ready, we must go to them if they are to live.”
• The boat turns and begins its way back down the canals.  We pass the same places on the way out as on the way in.  At one of the fields there are people playing with these balls that are illuminated from the inside from some sort of power source.  They kick them at people on the ship and they are kicked or swatted back like a vollyball.  I can’t tell if this is a friendly game or the people on the ship are being taunted.
• On the way the woman explains to me that while the girls who make the journey through the water tubes train for it, there is more.  She is their mother, and she must get to the exit tubes before sunset or the girls will be lost forever.
• I begin to notice that I do not recognize where we are, the ship is going a different way.
• “There are those who would like to see us fail, and they have blocked the way for the ship.” the woman says, “We are going to have to swim also.”
• The ship begins to flood itself again to bring the bow under water.  I am taken with the woman to a forward compartment.  I can hear the water outside surround the compartment as the ship sinks further.
• “How long am I going to have to hold my breath?” I ask.  “I’m not one of you.”
• The woman looks at me, smiles, but says nothing.
• I am waiting for the water to come rushing in, or to be spat out of the ship underwater like a torpedo, but it never happens. The sound of water fades and I realize the ship is surfacing.
• “You said we were going to swim!” I say to the woman.
• “The ship swims too.”
• We go back to the top of the ship and we are docked next to a set of stairs that lead up and around an old building. I realize that the ship must have descended under the water and gone through some underwater passages to get here because this is a completely different part of the city.   There are high metal fences around the buildings and the edge of the waterway where we are docked.
• I follow the mother and a few other people up the stairs.  I sense they are worried.  I look up at the sky and see that the clouds have turned a fire-red.  Sunset is almost here.
• We take a brisk pace up and around a series of steps, the sound of water running becomes louder.  We must be nearing the exit of the tubes where the girls will be.
• After another turn we come to a gate.  It is locked, and there is no way around.  The fences are too tall and too strong to get past.
• On the locked gate door is a sticker that I recognize to be from the local mayor, who is generally regarded to be evil.  he has locked this gate to make sure that we will not be able to get in, and that the girls will die.
• “We must find another way!” the woman says with some panic.
• We run back down the steps and take another path.  We exit onto a beach and find some bicycles.  Everyone in the group grabs a bike and begins riding off down the beach towards the tube exits.
• I am about to leave as well and then notice a pair of dive flippers.  Thinking that there might be more swimming I take them.

[this is where the dream ended, but I’m thinking something like:]

• We all ride down the beach.  We turn a corner and the tube exits are visible, but are surrounded by a large lake / pond.  We will have to swim the last leg, and get to the tube exits before sunset which is rapidly approaching.
• I will put on the dive flippers which makes me faster than everyone else, even though the other people in this group are all part of this “Swimmers” race.  Maybe they’re all older and have made “the swim” earlier in their lives but now they’re not as good.  In any case, having the dive flippers makes me faster and I get there first, just before the last bit of sun falls under the horizon.
• Maybe the woman will have realized this was the outcome, and earlier in the story gave me a “gift” which is really some sort of amulet that I need to use to open the tube exits and get the girls out.
• I use the amulet, the girls appear out of the water that is rushing out of the tube exits.
• The last of the sun falls below the horizon.