Through long dark corridors I run as I once more descend into the familiar dream realm… My heart races and fear and instinct drive’s me forward. “Run… Just Run and keep Running!” is the only advice my mind has the energy to produce… The corridors seem endless, no mirrors, just thousands upon thousands of doors lining the walls as far as my vision allows me to see. I run, looking for an exit…

“We can’t run much longer” my aching muscles scream at my brain. Tension between mind and body arise like a war fought between bitter rivals on the last battlefield. I crunch my eyes shut, I feel the energy seeping out of me as fatigue closes the gap between mind and matter. “Soon it won’t matter” I hear a voice in the back of my head whisper… “Soon, you will lose everything…”

For a moment, all dream like reality fades from my consciousness. I open my eyes… I’m standing in a pitch black room, barely able to see, I make out the glistening surface of a table in the midst of what feels like suffocating darkness. I walk to it, any familiar fatigue forgotten as I sense another presence nearing the same table.

“You think your alone in all this didn’t you?!”

The words sound no more than a whisper piercing the utter black death surrounding us. Barely able to keep my voice from trembling, I manage to form coherent words with my mouth, “Who are you?”

“I am you… or don’t you recognize me?” his voice seems more familiar now, yet… I still can’t seem to place it…

I desperately try to scan the room for any objects I could use to defend myself if it came to that. My head barely turns; my eyes are the only part of me moving… I curl my lips, searching for words to engross him in the conversation, taking his attention off my prying eyes searching for a salvation… “I know you from somewhere?” it was more a question than a statement, but I couldn’t care less whether he found it amusing when he burst out in a thick voiced, high pitch laugh…

“HAHAHA… You cannot hide your true motives from me boy! I see your eyes frightened and salvaging for safety…”

My heart freezes… My mind enters a cold dark state of forensic wonderment. Questions flop to the surface of my mind, seeking answers I wonder.  “How could he see my eyes move when it’s so Dark here?” Before I could come to a rationally reasonable answer, his voice boomed across the in fumigating abscess of light…

“Stop playing your childish games! I am here to guide you! I am you. I am your subconscious. Listen to me now! You need to stop running. Face your fears. For eternities the world has evolved, humans have evolved, animals and plants have evolved, but for eternity there has always been one ultimate choice to rationally define a man… the choice to ‘Live for nothing, or to Die for something!’ Make your choice!”

Like water in a bath with no plug, I feel myself getting sucked backwards… The last words of a booming voice follow me as I helplessly submit to the force pulling at me… “Be true to yourself, Make the choice!”

I open my eyes… For a second my eyes adjusted to the light, time slows as my mind tries to comprehend the events that have come to pass.
I feel the muscles of my lower right leg extend in trembling sensation of warmth and fatigue. I feel my foot hit the rock solid floor, desperately gripping onto the smooth surface for grip to push me off faster. My heart burns as it tirelessly tries to generate energy to keep me going, to keep me running…
My back arches trying to get the most wind speed and less resistance to boost the pace of my running… My arms swing by my sides, forcing momentum to continuously force my body forward. In a split second, I succumb to the wonderment of how all my various parts perform together to survive as a whole…
Quickly it dawns on me. “Be true to yourself…” as I awaken to time ready and motivated to continue my pathetic survival… I seize any movement in my lower legs, shifting my weight to support a steady slide to stop all movement. I turn around. I see the reddish glow of mist slightly illuminated by light moving towards me… Coming faster and faster, a flickering sense of fear streaks across my mind as I force myself to stay head fast and face anything that comes for me… As the red ball of mist rolls to me at tremendous speeds, I dig my shins into the floor and brace for impact as I close my eyes, tensing every muscle in my body, in preparation for potential annihilation…

As the collision between me and the red mist happened, I realized… Being true to myself meant more than what I gathered from the warning. I was running away from my fears… My heart can’t handle another blow… So I ran and kept running… I’ve been running for so long… True feelings aren’t skin deep… they are much deeper than that… And I have been blindly running away from it for so long…
The red mist, symbolizes nothing else, than love…

Shimmering, the world flaccidly starts blowing away around me as I return to consciousness… I open my eyes… I feel something in my chest that I haven’t felt for a long time…