Addiction

Looks like its from the sega saturn game. I don't remember anyone being this happy in the original.

Every night I have the same dream. I’m in an elevator that doesn’t stop falling. I’m completely terrified every minute of the ride but it’s the only place where I can sleep. Despite the intense fear I’m completely at peace, and as soon as I get out of it I’m confused and cold and desperate to get back in. I can’t go back though because I know at the end of the ride I’ll meet an end enjoyed only by similar minded deer on the highway. I know I need to get out but I jump back in anyways and continue my descent until I wake up. I never hit the floor and I can’t figure out what keeps saving me.

I know it sounds strange but I can always tell that I’m dreaming so I force myself to sleep in the dream. It’s kind of like the elevator makes stops on different floors but I always end up back on it. Its just that things get so cold out there and I feel dizzy and I have to jump back in or else I feel like I might collapse.

Like this one time I’m on the sun. I keep putting sunscreen on myself so I don’t burn up. I’m like bathing myself in a sunscreen shower but it’s never enough. There are people there with me but the sun doesn’t burn them at all. I keep asking them how they can stand there and not evaporate with every passing solar flare. They just laugh and tell me to keep using the sun screen and you’ll feel better eventually. Then I run out and I don’t know what to do. I jump off the sun and as I’m flying through space the elevator comes by and picks me up. The only thing worse than falling down an elevator shaft, is falling in a space elevator. You can’t figure out if your orbiting, falling, spinning, or if your motionless. Luckily it finds its magical endless shaft and I can scream in fear and fall back asleep as the g’s eventually knock me out.

This time it drops me in a bar. I’ve never been there and I know I’ve never been there, but yet I know everybody there and everybody knows me. I order a screwdriver and it makes me feel good. It feels as good as the elevator come to think of it. I order the girl next to me a drink and I begin making all the moves that have helped me convert so many times in the past. She slaps me in the face and then I realize it’s my ex girlfriend. So I try the girl sitting on my other side. Things are going good and I notice that her necklace is the kind of jewelry I dig. So I ask her if she likes my bracelet. She says of course I do, I bought it for you. Then I realize its my other ex girlfriend. The bar is full of all my exgirlfriends but I can’t tell the difference between them and any of the other girls. They all look the same and I can’t distinguish the thoughts of one from any of the others. I order another screwdriver so I can escape and the bartender sets it down. I reach down to pick it up but its not a screwdriver at all, it’s the elevator again. I jump back in and praise whatever god that invented gravity.

I get out this time and I feel beaten and exhausted. I’m wearing a big blue hat that says “I’m Number 1!” written on it. I’m a pathetic loser that can never stop disappointing himself. Somebody is always better than me and I can never prove myself to my betters. Somebody beats my high score, they bench more weight than me, their grades are better, and they do all this while being all star wake boarders and gymnasts in their free time. I get frustrated and try to throw off the hat but no matter how hard I pull it won’t come off. My friends come over to cheer me up and they take us out drinking to console me. The more I drink the looser the hat becomes and eventually I’m able to take it off. After I am totally smashed I go to find the hat but it’s nowhere to be found. I think I finally see it but it turns out to be the elevator. I tell the elevator to screw off, and that I don’t need it anymore because the booze is doing the trick this time. However my balance isn’t what it should be and I end up falling in anyways.

There’s somebody else in the elevator this time. He’s got these beautiful diamond teeth. I ask him if he has them to chew normally unchewable things. He says nah, the chicks love em, the hoods respect em, gives him bling and flash, and it gives him some extra cash if he ever gets arrested. He says the feds aren’t allowed to pull out teeth bought with drug money because its cruel and unusual punishment. I don’t know if I’m happy to have someone else in the same predicament as me or if I’m upset that I have to share the warmth with other people. Luckily as we fall I notice the g’s are pulling way harder on me, my superiority comes back into check and I don’t mind sharing since obviously it cares much more about me.

I get off and I’m on a sea of glass. Time stands still as I venture forth marveling at my surroundings. Nothing changes and it feels good and I’m not afraid. The sea looks like a giant emerald and spherical droplets hang in the air from cascading waves. I grab one and bring it close to my face and see tiny fish suspended inside. I wander for hours and eventually find a giant blue whale several feet below me. I can see something strange in his baleen but I can’t make out what it is although its familiarity is striking. Suddenly time comes back into motion and I sink immediately. I’m surrounded by thousands of tiny fish frantically flapping their fins seemingly trying to escape something horrible. I can feel a torrent of raw force moving towards me and as I scream the fish scatter. Behind them is the giant whale with his mouth gaping open ready to swallow everything in its path. I think about all the tuna and salmon I’ve devoured in my life and kick myself for not being a vegetarian. I give up hope and accept my fate but as the whale gets closer I can make out what I saw in its teeth earlier. It’s the elevator. I jump inside and escape my doom and promise myself that I’m going to go to Japan and order a whale burger as soon as I get the chance.

Inside the elevator I’m soaking wet and fish fall out of my pockets. My newfound friend doesn’t seem the least bit interested in my predicament. Somehow the fish swim around in the intense g’s as if to them it was as fluid as water. I envy their freedom as I’m pinned up against the ceiling and try to reach out to grab one but am too weak to fight off the resistance. My mate finally yells up to me and asks why it couldn’t have been dolphins. He always liked dolphins and watched Flipper when he grew up as a kid. He said him and his boys used to make bets whether or not the dolphin would be able to kill the shark. Most of the thugs were too tough to bet on the dolphin so he won a lot of money and was able to buy some bangin Iversons. “Best shoes I ever had” and a tear came out from his face and all the fish swam over to it only to be disappointed by its salt content.

I get off this time and I’m in a giant underwater prison. There are guards everywhere with no hope for escape. Outside the water was full of sharks and stingrays and crazed mermen with tridents. I got a man in the cell with me. He says they put him in here because he liked to go up to cops and race them. He’d always beat them and as soon as he notice them calling back up, he’d shoot them and escape. He said he did this almost 9 times before they caught him. He said he had this great plan to escape but that he needed a partner. I loved the idea and I felt alive when I heard him speak. He said he was going to build a giant elevator and we were going to take it to the roof and get out of here. We finished it and let him press the up button. It came down to us, but instead of there being a bellman in there his mother was there with pickaxes and shotguns. He goes in first and I try to follow him but the door slams shut and the elevator disappears.

I curse the elevator gods for forsaking me. We had always worked so good with each other in the past and I couldn’t see why they were leaving me now when I needed them the most. I sit in my cell for what feels like an eternity. I go eat only to find that now I too have teeth made of diamonds. My fellow inmates surround me and knock out all my teeth. The guards help and they split the take. They finally let me go and as soon as I get out I look for the first elevator I can find. Any elevator would work. Maybe one of those old school ones with the pretty wrought iron gates. Even one of those rotating restaurant elevators or those see through hotel elevators that I always wanted to have sex with somebody in.

I can’t find an elevator anywhere. I try an escalator but it moves too slowly. I try running down the stairs, but the safety rail keeps me from falling. Nothing gives me the g’s the elevator did so effortlessly and so consistently. Eventually it stops bothering me so much. Every time I’m on an airplane I start craving it but I’m able to live without it. I don’t feel cold and dizzy anymore. One day I’m walking down the street and I hear a giant crash behind me. I turn around and see this big mash of metal and flesh. It’s hard to tell what it is but I notice there are some diamond teeth implanted in some of the metal. I find some little plastic buttons with numbers and letters surrounded by stars printed on them. I realize that it’s the elevator. That poor fool never got off. The teeth kind of looked like they were in the position of a smile, but the only forensic expertise I have comes from watching CSI. I felt bad for him and wished that he had gotten off with me earlier. However I also felt jealous and kind of wished that it was me who had been in there. I guess I won’t ever be able to shake off these desires, but at least I’ll be alive.

I go back to the sun and I notice that it is not hot as it used to be. My spray on SPF 15 is somehow doing the job just fine. I see all the other people there that were laughing at me before but this time they are clapping. I see through the solar flares. One of them is me with the “I’m number 1 hat”. Except he doesn’t look sad, he looks like he just graduated and got an excellent job. There’s a girl next to him but she doesn’t look like all my ex girlfriends. She is different and prettier and doesn’t need sunscreen or alcohol or anything to keep the sun from burning her. I look down from the sun and I see the underwater prison. However they can’t get me up here and I’m totally safe. It feels warm on the sun and I realize that the elevator was never helping me. It was trying to take me away from here and get me to crash far down below. I kick myself for ever jumping in, in the first place. And it sucks that I have to wear SPF 15 when everybody else that never jumped in is totally fine. But I’m happy that I’m here and I’m alive and I finally wake up. I never have the dream again and I face the sun each day with hope and optimism.

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