Trenton

I wake up in a cold sweat. I’m lying on the ground of our hotel room. I’m breathing incredibly heavily, and I can’t move. The room is dark, but I can see that it’s perfectly fine. I try to remember how I got here, then everything comes rushing back. The nightmare world, dying, everything. I close my eyes and take deep breaths. Dying was not a pleasant experience. Kylie must me freaking out. But wait. How am I still alive? Dying makes you escape the dream world? It must be. I open my eyes again. I try to sit up, but I realize I’m immobilized. I can move my arms and legs, but I’m wrapped in something. I lift my head and see a small dark mass in the center of the room. Extending from it are dark tentacles. One is wrapped around everyone in our room. Three are going through the door and into the girls’ room. I struggle for a couple minutes, then stop. I concentrate and finally, after a couple more minutes, the tentacle crumbles like stone. I stand up and walk over shakily to the dark mass. It’s a black orb, spinning violently, about a foot in diameter. There appears to be no imperfections, but when I try to touch it, my hand rebounds off of an invisible shield surrounding it. I look around our room in a daze. I walk to the mirror hung on the wall. I see myself looking back at myself. Thank goodness. I go to my bed and sit down. I put my head in my hands and massage my temples. I have a slight headache. It starts to go away, and I look at the alarm clock next to my bed. It reads 5:02. I lay back in bed, but am unable to sleep. Finally, as I’m starting to doze off, Eric gasps and wakes up in his bed. I sit up and walk over to him. His eyes look blurry and out of focus. He’s breathing deeply, and I see him start to struggle to move. He turns and sees me for the first time, and I see confusion cross his face.

“Don’t tell me,” he says sleepily. “I’m dead, aren’t I?”

“Nope,” I say, “but you were almost there. Concentrate to get out of the bonds.”

“Concentrate on what?”

 “Something you care about. That’s what I did, and it seemed to work.” He closes his eyes, and instantly I see them crumble. He gets up and looks around.

“You might want to sit down,” I suggest.

“What happened?” he asks groggily. I explain my theory on how we got out, and he told me what happened after I had died. We both agree to sleep off the grogginess. I slide under the covers and fall asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow.