Greenlines

I have the same nightmare every night. When I close my eyes, green lines flicker against the dark. They solidify, forming bars like the laser lines in those spy heist movies, a cage I can’t escape. The lines speed towards me, the flicker ephemeral around the sharp green glow. They’re getting closer, closer, closer, I’m scared and I want to run, but I’m frozen, and—

And then I wake up.

Most nights, I find myself flat on my back in bed, looking up into the pitch black of my bedroom ceiling, bedsheets wildly twisted. I let my heartbeat wind down, then get up, disoriented, and fumble for the light switch. I flick it and the yellow glow blinds me for a second. I close my eyes and see green flickers again, and, panicking, afraid I’m dreaming again, I force my eyes open. They adjust. I stare at the desk and bookshelf and piles of dirty laundry scattered around my room and remind myself that the greenlines aren’t real, they can’t get me, and I am in the real world.

Well, most nights.

Tonight is different.

Tonight, the green lights flicker and coalesce into green grid lines again, and the lines merge and cage me and rush towards me—

and rush towards me—

and rush towards me—

and this is the part where I wake up in the black dark again, but the green keeps coming, and soon I’m enveloped in it, and then—

And then the green fades away into nothing and it’s dark, but not completely. The room is bathed in a pale green light. This is not my bedroom; it’s too big, long, with a ceiling so high I can’t make it out in the dark, vaguely metallic-colored like the inside of a spaceship. Hulking pieces of equipment lie scattered around, piles of torn and frayed wires coiled up in piles at their bases, and other junk I can’t quite make out. I can feel my heart pounding in my chest. This is all wrong. You’re not supposed to feel your heartbeat in dreams.

I take a step forward. Complete silence. The green light emanates from somewhere in the distance ahead of me and with the strange logic of dreams, I know I must go to it.

I pick my way through the defunct machines and what can only be garbage. Their shapes are sharp, hefty, imposing when silhouetted against the green light, but up close, mundane: something like a control panel or a printer, discarded food containers and unneeded spare parts, all collecting dust and mold.

As I make my way towards the end of the long atrium (and it never seems to end, as though becoming longer and longer the more I walk through it), I hear breathing. I look down to my side. I am not alone. There is a creature curled up around the base of a rusted machine. The first thing I know is that it is alive, breathing, shifting slightly. The second is that it is black, long, and reptilian. The third thing, I note with a deep sigh of relief, is that it’s asleep. I tiptoe away from it. The creature is covered in scales, black with a green sheen, perhaps a reflection of the green light that bathes this place, perhaps originating in the scales themselves. Spines cascade down the creature’s head, neck, and spine; its tail is as long as its body and is also covered in curved, wickedly sharp spines. Its front teeth protrude out of its mouth, like a saber-toothed tiger, thin and sharp as razor blades. I am careful to avoid this monster. To my terror, I discover more like it, all curled up around machines. They are, thankfully, all asleep, but I still feel my heart knocking in my chest at twice its normal speed and I desperately hope they can’t hear it. My heart doesn’t slow until I am well clear of them. It occurs to me, now that I can think again, that these cold-blooded creatures must be attracted to the warmth of the whirring computer processors.

I finally reach the far end of this huge room, and I notice the green light is becoming brighter and brighter, almost unbearably so, like too-harsh daylight streaming through a window after a night of poor sleep. No more trash—all clear. I see a great green oval screen, as tall as a building.

And a long, curved black slit, slowly bending towards me

It’s not a screen.

It’s a giant eye.

Ice-cold fear shoots through my heart and limbs and I tumble backwards. I fall into a machine and my head hits the edge of its metal outline hard. The sound is loud, echoing through the whole atrium. The reptilian creatures rise and I feel their eyes on me, all glowing and green, an army of green flickers in eyes and in scales. I try to get up to run but my feet are tangled in those old wires. Crap. Crap crap crap I’m gonna die—

The green dragons converge on me and the eye is staring right at me—

And then I am lying on my back in the dark, drenched in cold sweat.