Dreams

Friday, June 30, 2023

I was part of a heavily armed team that was in an empty elementary school, tasked with cleaning out some kind of deadly infestation.

Myself and the only other surviving member of the team were in a hallway that had an elevator at one end and a left turn at the other. Glass display shelves lined most of the walls, filled with art projects and framed pictures. We were moving away from the elevator, towards the opposite end of the hallway. I had an ACR and a handgun at my side. My teammate had some kind of M4 style rifle and a handgun as well.

Behind us, from the elevator, came several horrible screeches, along with what sounded like claws on the inside of the elevator.

We flinched and continued down the hallway, but my teammate turned around and kept an eye on the elevator, his rifle trained on it.

We were less than twenty feet from the left turn when my teammate shouted over his shoulder that the elevator had been breached and they were about to come through. He began to fire his rifle behind me, and soon the hallway echoed with gunshots and high pitched inhumane screams.

Tempting as it was to turn around, I kept my eye on the corner, my hands gripping my ACR tightly.

I knew I had less than half a mag in my rifle before I had to switch to my handgun, no doubt having spent my ammunition on whatever was following us from the elevator.

My teammate suddenly shouted that he needed help, and I took one last look at the corner, a funny feeling in my stomach, before turning around with my rifle to bear.

I almost froze in horror.

Over a dozen nightmarish creatures were tearing through the elevator doors.

They vaguely reminded me of Xenomorphs. They were over six feet tall, their bodies black with long tails and arms, each appendage ending in clawed fingers. They had oblong heads with no visible eyes, gigantic jaws lined with rows of sharp teeth, and fleshy tongues that seemed to have minds of their own, whipping around whenever their mouths opened.

I began to fire my ACR in short bursts at the creatures, dropping one, two, three, before my rifle stopped firing. Bewildered, I looked down at it and saw that it still appeared to have rounds. I ejected the magazine and to my despair, found a casing so far and complicatedly stuck in the magazine receiver that I knew the time spent unjamming it would result in our deaths.

I switched my ACR to my left hand and drew my handgun.

I screamed at my teammate that my rifle was out of commission and we needed to leave.

We were at the end of the hallway, so I barreled around the corner.

A flash of black against the wall made my heart stop. Several of the creatures were standing against it, allegedly silently waiting for us.

I brought my handgun up and shot three of them, painting the wall behind them in blood and gore.

My handgun ran out of ammo after the third creature dropped to the ground, which was already soaked in blood.

I turned to my teammate behind me only to find open air.

He was halfway around the corner, lying on his back. His rifle was ten feet away, his hands gripping his handgun, which was empty. Several of the creatures lay dead or twitching on the ground before him.

We exchanged silent looks as the creatures converged on us from both sides.