DN9: July 12, 1985

TOW

Dreaming; Night of
July 12, 1985

7:36

₄Slightly less than half the world appeared to be in violent revolt against slightly more than half. Of course, the larger group was in power, better armed, and the persecutors; of course, I was in the smaller group. After taking stock of the situation, I started encouraging people to fight back. At first, no one was fighting; the two groups were in separate areas, but there was an unnatural still in the air—the calm before the storm. Then I heard shots, signalling the beginning of the annihilation of most of my side by the other. I ran and ran, away from the shots, and somewhere along the way, met up with about three compatriots, whom I apparently knew. We made our way to a canal at the city's large port and stole a large motorboat. The bad army began to catch up to us. We had trouble keeping the boat running, until I discovered a sort of wire governor on it which served as a theft-prevention device when in place (I knew this because the boat's owner had failed to remove the installation instructions). I ripped it out of place, and we took off to the left, as seen from the city bank whence we'd started. We soon ran into resistance that direction, however, and turned back, speeding in the other direction, looking for a passage out to the open sea (the canal seemed to be mainly used for parking and storage of boats and ships of all sizes). There was a crowd of non-participant civilians on the bank opposite from the city (a small crowd, really a few scattered people)—good, bad, or mixed, I'm not sure. As we went by, one cute little boy (2 years old? 3?) got all excited. I was feeling particularly benevolent toward him, after all, he was just a helpless pawn in another's game, so I waved at him. That proved to be a mistake, as the little kid then broke away from his mother and somehow managed to jump to our ship. He didn't quite make it aboard, but I caught him by the arms. I realized that we couldn't take him with us—we were anticipating a week or two starving on the open sea until we found a safe place to establish a base—so I threw him back regretfully to his mother. He didn't make it, but landed in the shallow water about a foot from the edge and his mother. He started crawling around so I assumed that he was fine, and we went on. Soon, we came to a bridge of land that totally divided the canal into two. By this time, the bad guys were rapidly closing in, so we pulled the boat out of the water and attempted to pull it across the approximately 10-yard-wide strip of land. We hadn't gotten very far, however, when the bereaved figure of the aforementioned mother ran up. From her appearance, I knew what she was going to say, but the others with me did not seem to realize. I was moving away, climbing up a hill, perhaps to scout out a site for a last stand, when she arrived, screaming at us that her boy had drowned. Just as she made this announcement, I stumbled across a small mound of earth on the steep slope of the hill. Attached was a poignant sign, apologizing to the dead and signed, "a rival." I thought to myself that this was far more significant than the death of one boy in a war where tens of thousands were being killed. (G)