Dream: Cave Elephants
Wednesday, May 7th:
We had teleported or rematerialized inside the foyer of an underground research complex. Round, concrete tunnels big enough for school buses to pass each other met in the large chamber. The entrance from the surface looked more like a natural cavern, but the central section had collapsed decades or centuries ago. The rough-hewn barbarian tribesman that acted as wilderness specialist for our group ran ahead into a wide lab. He hopped up onto a table, grabbed the mechanical lattice from which the lights and instruments were suspended, and swung up into the darkness. A moment later, while the rest of the group explored a side passage, a bearded Neanderthal wandered out of a tunnel and joined us. I worried that everyone would mistake him for the barbariantheir hair colors were different, but they were drawn the same waybut I couldn't say anything. I imagined someone turning to him in a crisis and telling him to run a bypass on a security system, to which the Neanderthal would reply, "Ugh oohg."
I searched an old locker room and bathroom. Everything had its own stall, even the sink. I had to close and latch the stall door in order for the sink to work, but the stall was so cramped I was practically sitting on the basin. I washed my hands carefully.
Later, we decided to clear away the debris in the entrance tunnel so that we could release the family of shaggy prehistoric elephants onto the surface, somewhere near Arizona. Outside, it was still the year 1820 or so; the world still had dim corners little visited by scientists and explorers. We figured they'd be discovered as a new species (the New World Elephant?), and no one would guess that we'd brought them forward through time.
We had teleported or rematerialized inside the foyer of an underground research complex. Round, concrete tunnels big enough for school buses to pass each other met in the large chamber. The entrance from the surface looked more like a natural cavern, but the central section had collapsed decades or centuries ago. The rough-hewn barbarian tribesman that acted as wilderness specialist for our group ran ahead into a wide lab. He hopped up onto a table, grabbed the mechanical lattice from which the lights and instruments were suspended, and swung up into the darkness. A moment later, while the rest of the group explored a side passage, a bearded Neanderthal wandered out of a tunnel and joined us. I worried that everyone would mistake him for the barbariantheir hair colors were different, but they were drawn the same waybut I couldn't say anything. I imagined someone turning to him in a crisis and telling him to run a bypass on a security system, to which the Neanderthal would reply, "Ugh oohg."
I searched an old locker room and bathroom. Everything had its own stall, even the sink. I had to close and latch the stall door in order for the sink to work, but the stall was so cramped I was practically sitting on the basin. I washed my hands carefully.
Later, we decided to clear away the debris in the entrance tunnel so that we could release the family of shaggy prehistoric elephants onto the surface, somewhere near Arizona. Outside, it was still the year 1820 or so; the world still had dim corners little visited by scientists and explorers. We figured they'd be discovered as a new species (the New World Elephant?), and no one would guess that we'd brought them forward through time.