What a Wonder is a Gun

**WARNING: GRAPHIC VIOLENCE**

This dream was pretty disturbing in the main conflict of it, but when I woke up, the predominant feeling was one of triumph. My dream was part "Diary of Anne Frank," part "On the Waterfront." The dream itself sounds pretty melodramatic, but I can't think of any other language to describe it in. It was far from comedic at the time.

I was helping some new friends move their stuff from an LDS Church building, where BYU-Idaho's housing office had been letting them stay until their apartment was ready. I don't know who these friends are in real life, although one of them looked a little like a co-worker of mine. Otherwise, they're strangers. We had to move everything...beds, clothes, shelves; all of it had to go into the back of my truck. But Adolf Hitler and a small band of Idaho rebels (their identities and nature remained mysterious to me, I only knew they were there) made it difficult. They were hiding around corners and would shoot at you as you were moving things out of the building. It was like being in the the videogame HALO. It was kind of an accepted thing, and people just tried to make do with the situation, instead of doing anything to stop it.

I helped one friend move, and managed to avoid wounds by using her furniture and suitcases to block the bullets. But in the course of taking the mattress out to the car, this friend's sister was shot. I watched the blood and gray matter pour out of her head next to me. She had been helping me carry the mattress, and when she was shot, she let go of it and it fell against both of us, pinning us underneath. I was trying to get up and run, but my hands were wet with blood all over them, and I couldn't lift the mattress off of my legs. Finally someone came and shoved it off, and I ran, bullets shattering the walls around my ears as I finally reached the door of the church building. I took a shower in my friend's new apartment to get the blood and brains out of my hair while she called their parents and was comforted by her roomates.

I go back to the church building to get the mattress. (The logical thing to do in my dream...none of us even considered any other option.) I'm alone this time, my friends waiting at the door. There's some sort of treaty, that we've allowed the Nazis to occupy the building only if they do not exercise any violence outside of it. The moment you're outside the door, they cannot shoot. Still, I know my friends are taking a big risk in waiting for me.

I find the mattress where we had left it. Because its a dream, there's no blood or anything anywhere, but the body is gone. I remember the smoke I had seen coming from a close-by building and I decide I don't want to think about it. I go to pick up the mattress, and as soon as I have it up, a bullet hits it from the other side. It misses me, but it breaks a wooden beam across the bottom of the box spring in half, and the whole thing sort of collapses on that side. I swear loudly and try to keep it all upright, while at the same time using it as a barricade. Then another bullet comes through and splinters the other bottom beam. All of a sudden, I see the image of my friend, the one whose sister was killed, floating above me, just over the mattress. Its as if she's laying in some invisible upper bunk, and I can just see her head and torso leaning over the side. She says to me "Leave the mattress. You are going to be killed."

I decide to make a run for it. Shoving the mattress over, I start sprinting with all my strength for the door. Its a good 40 feet away, but I go for it anyway. All of a sudden I hear a blast, and pain explodes in my right thigh. I fall to the ground and when I look down, I see blood all over, and I know that I've been shot. But since its the thickest part of my thigh, I decide I can still make it, and get up to run again (apparently I don't have a femoral artery in my dreams). I can hardly stand it, but I run anyway. Then I feel the same pain in my left calf. I fall again. Another gunshot wound. But in that moment, I decide that I will not be a victim of the neo-Nazis. I will avenge the death of my friend's sister by surviving this exit of the building. I get up somehow and continue staggering to the door. My right ankle takes a bullet, and then my left arm. I'm starting to pass out, but I still aim for the door.

Now things are like that climactic scene in "On the Waterfront," when Marlon Brando is staggering to the warehouse after the fight. Except I'm still being fought, and there's no one there to help me. My vision is blurring...I can see the door, but I can't tell if its moving or if I am, and everything around the edges of my vision are fading in and out. I see men in uniforms and handguns come out from behind the corners. They think I'm a goner, but I refuse to fall. They shoot again, this time I can't even tell what they've hit, but I stagger for a moment, and start to crawl towards the door. I reach up to open it, and I'm shot again in the side. By now, I'm counting the bullets as they hit me, and I'm up to six now. I know I won't survive if the number reaches 10. No one can survive 10 bullet wounds, especially not at this range. I can see the reflection of the men behind me in the glass of the door. I push it open, and all of a sudden I'm kicked from behind. I land on the pavement right outside the door, and I'm shot in the elbow. "Seven," I think, and I roll onto my back in pain. I look up and see that its Hitler himself standing over me, a pistol in hand. I turn my body to cough up the blood that's filling my mouth, and even though I'm barely conscious, I try to crawl away. I know my friends are watching, trying to stay hidden. Hitler's breaking the rules, and it makes me angry that they're now in danger.

I've made it about 3 feet away, dragging my body towards the car in the parking lot. I'm about 10 feet away from the edge of the sidewalk, and I can hear Hitler behind me. I know I won't make it, but now I'm simply determined to make it as far as I can...make some sort of point, do all I can to show how unjustified Hitler's actions are. He kicks my hip, and I fall over onto my back. He keeps me in place with his foot-- he's got it resting on my right knee. He aims and at point-blank range, he shoots my left shoulder. "Eight," I think. "I'm going to die." He shifts the gun slightly to aim at my other shoulder. BANG! "Nine. I'm sorry. I didn't make it. He won this time." Hitler kneels down now. I'm barely conscious, but I feel the cold metal of the pistol next to my right temple. I know I'm going to die in the next second, even though the gun is pointed at the ground, so that when it goes off, it will only blow one side of my head off. But I know I won't survive it anyway. I try to focus my vision for one last moment, and gather up the spit and blood and bile in my mouth. I muster all the strength in my body and spit. Hitler's face, looking down on me, my blood all over his face, is the last thing I see before I hear the final bang. My friend starts screaming my name. "Ten," I think. And then everything goes black.

I open my eyes to see my friend leaning over the edge of the upper bunk. (The dream is continuing...) I can't move, and I can feel myself bandaged almost from head to toe. I can only see out of one eye. I try to stammer something, but it hurts too much to talk. My friend smiles down on me. I start to wonder what's going on...if I'm dead, why can't I move? And why do I still hurt? My friend smiles down on me and says "You made it. Ten gunshot wounds, and you survived. The Nazis are gone now. You made it." I black out again.

The next time I open my eyes, I can see out of both of them. (But I'm still dreaming...) I notice that a lot of the bandages are gone...I just have one on my leg and one on my arm, and one side of my head is all wrapped up. I can't believe that I'm alive. My friend tells me that I'd been out for 2 weeks, but they knew I'd make it. I had survived 10 gunshot wounds. They let me "sleep off" most of the healing. I try to get up, and I'm so stiff, its difficult, but it hurts a lot less than I thought it would.

I sit up, and even stand to walk around a little. I know that my life is a miracle. I begin to try to help out in cleaning the room a little bit. The next part of my dream is like right after any severe injury in real life. I'm limited, but I'm kind of enjoying the opportunity to take a little break. And I find that I'm not so limited as might be expected. I enjoy helping out in the little ways I can. I learn that not many people know the details of my story, but they know that the Nazis have ceased their occupation because they broke their treaty. It's exactly how I want it to be. We have a memorial service for my friend's sister, and I feel like I did a great thing...I know there's still so much hate and war and evil in the world, but I know that by surviving, I helped chalk up one for the good side.