The landscape was barren, save for a few broken down buildings set far apart from each other. The skies overhead were clear, bright blue with a shining sun and white clouds. This was in eerie contrast to the blackened, charred ground. Dark smoke rose from the buildings, as if something had just recently blown up.

There were no signs of life. No animal, large or small, nor any people. It was just devoid of life. There was no sound except for an occasional wisp of the wind blowing through. All the plants were dead, turned brown and broken apart. It looked like hell picked a fight with this place, and had won.

Something was moving through, something fast. Dark shapes moved through the buildings like shadows, snaking their way around. The blobs appeared to be chasing something. The shape split off into three and headed between two ruined buildings. The three black blobs darted off in opposite directions, converging around one particular spot.

The shapes were headed towards a boy. The boy, at first, was obscured, only vaguely resembling a person. He was running for his life, whimpering as his feet bounded the cracked ground. The shapes were swerving around him, getting closer to grabbing him.

The boy attempted no call of help. There was no one around to help him. He pushed himself harder, the wind flapping against his tattered clothes and bruised body. His efforts to get away were all in vain. His foot caught on a raised piece of dirt and he fell down, smacking his face hard against the rock surface.

His whimpering increasing, he twisted himself onto his back and began to crawl away from the shapes on his hands and knees. The kid was still obscured by shadow. The creatures could see him nonetheless and they closed in on him. The creatures covered his body, turning into black goop, and the boy let out a wild scream of pain.

sss

"Yah!"

Odd screamed and bolted awake in his sleep. His face was covered in sweat. His eyes went wide and his hands were trembling. He breathed in and out rapidly, trying to calm himself down. 'It was just a dream...it was just a dream...' He told himself.

He looked over at the clock. It was five in the morning. He looked over at Ulrich and sighed with relief that he was still asleep. A part of him was grateful for those earplugs. He didn't want to wake up Ulrich and have to explain to him the nightmare that he had. He doubted Ulrich would want to hear about it anyway. Everyone gets nightmares once in a while. They weren't any big deal.

Except there was something off about this dream he was having. He wasn't dwelling on how realistic it was. Most people who have nightmares believe them to be all too real. No, something else was bothering him about the dream.

He's been having it every other night. He wasn't sure if he ever heard of such a thing. He's heard of recurring nightmares, but they were usually every night. He's never heard of a nightmare that only comes once every other night. And the dream was almost always the same, with little details changing.

At first, there was no boy in the dream, just shadows moving around. Then over time, something came into view, something the monsters were chasing. And in each dream, the detail gets clearer, more vivid. The boy becomes more visible, and the more he does so, the more Odd starts to recognize him. He suspected that after the next couple times he has the dream, the boy will be in full view and he could finally identify him.

Why would he care who the boy in the dream was? It was just a dream, or rather nightmare. But the nightmare had an unsettling feeling about it. It was almost foreboding, as if it were trying to tell him something. He thought about telling his friends, but they would brush it off as just regular nightmares. Disturbing, but regular nonetheless.

It had been five months since they defeated Therizino. The memory of her death still clings to him to this day. He had wanted there to be away to return to Therizino her humanity. Jeremie had told him that was impossible. Whatever XANA did to create her, it destroyed any hope of reviving whoever Therizino really was. She was thoroughly turned into a monster and there was no going back. Odd had eventually made peace, for the most part, with what happened.

The dreams started occurring exactly three months later, on the three month 'anniversary', if one could even call it that, of Therizino's demise. He can't help but feel the dreams are related to Therizino, perhaps based on his fear he had for her when she was still around. The blob monsters looked just like the ones that almost killed him. There had to be a reason he was having these dreams all of a sudden.

Odd laid back down on his bed. He needed to get some sleep. Tomorrow was a new day and he knew he'd feel better once it was morning. So far, his screaming at night hadn't woken up Ulrich, so he was safe from having to tell anyone about the dreams.

But he knew, sooner or later, they would find out. And if he explained it to them, would they take him seriously or just brush it off?