Ziggurat

The other night I had a bizarre experience. As I slept, I was of two minds, as it’s often the case in awake life: experiencing, feeling, or thinking a thing and its opposite. This, however, was different, what I can relate it the closest to is playing a most immersive RPG or videogame in first person, perhaps a movie, or a futuristic VR experience. Fundamentally, the concept of “the real me” (my body, my abilities, and so on) was diluted and reduced to almost a spectator of my own actions, I couldn’t tell perfectly that this part of me was the most real though, instead, the character “I” played was the “me”. “I” became the little cricket that analysis and judges the actions of “me”, but this “me” couldn’t tell “I” was there and I as “me” was in control of my own actions, it’s just that they didn’t align at all with what “the real me” would do. If, so far, there isn’t any meaning to discern from what I wrote, the story I experienced, was, in itself somewhat esoteric.

I was a wealthy “american” man in my late 20s or early 30s, about 5ft7 an athletic but not rugged physic, with curtained sun-kissed strawberry blonde hair, honey brown eyes framed by good-looking soft arch darker shaped eyebrows, a well-groomed stubble, and a warm tan complexion of a white fella that regularly uses a tanning bed. Looked like a late ’80s or ’90s movie adventurer/action lead a la Indiana Jones, or Rick O’Connell, but with less “authentic” - branded clothes and gear more for the look than for actual use, and some really nice black aviator sunglasses.

I arrived in a helicopter to some “South American country like Peru”, a remote village where people spoke a language I couldn’t understand and Spanish, which I also couldn’t understand, (as the “explorer guy”, but I do understand, so I understood as me but not as him) I had a translator who could speak Spanish and English, but not the language or dialect the villagers spoke. The translator was younger than me, a good-looking looking south-american man, much better prepared and less flashy, very professional but warm and personable.

I was on vacation and wanted to “visit” a famous trail and live my explorer fantasy. I wanted to go “by myself”, so the translator found me a guide that could get me there. This guide an older man refused to lead me anywhere but a woman with a toddler where also looking for this same trail, so I paid for us all to come. She wasn’t a tourist, but she wasn’t a local either, she was south-american but on a pilgrimage of some kind, spiritual, but I didn’t give a fuck as the guy and just shrugged, I was glad I could finally get on with my journey but frustrated I had to share it with these people(me, the real me wanted to ask questions or at least be respectful of this woman, but I was a douchebag). I wanted the “real pure experience” (such an ass). We rode there on some animal like an alpaca or a donkey, I’m not sure.

The whole way I ignored the woman and the child. We started to walk after a bit, on the mountains where the animals couldn’t pass, on maybe the third day we arrived at a valley that was totally unexpected to me and the woman, the guide just explained that this was a real secret, smiled and left us to continue. I walked with the intention of putting some distance between myself and the pair I had been forced to travel with and was pretty sure was slowing me down, and being a bummer. Across the valley, we saw something chilling on the other mountainous side. There was a verdant forest separated by some colossal stairway that on the top led to fog and at the bottom of the valley led to a natural arena where hundreds of people stood in complete silence. I, being an oblivious idiot, decided to rapidly and loudly descent smiling like this was the adventure I came here for. The woman, afraid of being left alone, picked up the child and hesitantly followed me.

When I reached the people at the bottom, they were of all creeds and seemed to be silently praying. I walked around and explored, and saw “high ranks” of every religion I knew, and many I didn’t recognize, it was spectacular. The woman trailed behind me and for the first time held my arm and begged me, with watery eyes, to please go back with her before dark, before anyone noticed we were there. Somethings resonated simultaneously for the first time: I realized, that the child appeared sick; the people around were alive, praying silently in different manners, but none had acknowledged our presence; I had a sinking feeling in my stomach, and an icy glass feeling ran through my veins, I looked at her, I saw her, she knew that, and there was relief in both of our expressions. I picked up the toddler carefully, the woman looked tired and glad, and we started to make our way back through the crowds.

There were no paths, it was sunset already, we were carefully weaving through the crowd, looking down, trying not to step on anyone’s vestments, when suddenly quietly a man smiling in front of us calmly told us the prayers would go on through the night. We didn’t even scream, just stood there in shock. A couple more people showed up from behind this elderly man, tough-looking, holding unlit torches and crossing towards the crowds behind us. We were almost to the valley wall we came down from, I tried to smile at the man, and say something to the effect of the child being sick, and needing to go back. The man insisted we stay, so gently, and explained that in this sanctuary perhaps the child would be cured. I looked at the woman, with her quiet feverish child in my arms, and turned my back to the man, I asked if this was the reason she came to the trail, and she sheepishly admitted it was. I looked at the smiling gentle old man and suddenly I was as embarrassed as the woman, what were we running from? this was just one of those sacred ecumenic places - people were just praying, and the strange feeling we got was probably just because of the quietude. The old man steered us through the people, it almost looked like he was opening a path, toward the opposite wall in the direction of the staircase.

As we went the torches were lit. It looked beautiful and warm, the woman held my arm looking around in awe, I felt a fondness towards her and the child I held, we were experiencing something together, something alien? spiritual? divine? - Human. When we got to the staircase it split in two around a fountain and a pond, and continued behind it, out of sight. I assumed this fountain, was the healing for the child, and so did the woman. We looked at the old man and he nodded. We dabbed a cloth of the water across the toddler’s face and almost immediately the child seemed better, the woman looked relieved and happy, there were tears forming again but they seemed to be of joy now.

As we were preparing to leave once again, the old man said we should visit the spring. We tried to respectfully refuse, saying it was late, we had come from afar, and so on. He smiled, no different from the first smile, but it conjured very different feelings, all of a sudden it felt like the attention of every person around us was on us. He just pointed behind the fountain towards where the stairs presumably started. Without much agency, I picked up the child, held the woman’s hand and we moved to the back of the fountain, only to find that the stairs descended. We went underground and we found ourselves in what looked like a giant natural cavern, at the center there was some kind of ziggurat. The atmosphere was dense and damp, and the smell of the torches was very intense. We were oriented to enter this structure; we navigated the inside and it was like a maze of shrinking narrow corridors.

As we progressed, and the space shrunk, surprisingly the kid felt better, and that kept us relatively grounded and optimistic. It was so small the three of us started walking single-file, me in front and the kid in the middle, and the woman behind. Me and the woman spoke in English because the kid apparently didn’t understand English, and besides “I” didn’t understand Spanish. We discussed our situation, what was happening if it was good or bad, and what our options were… suddenly she went quiet and started to whisper, as I turned around, I just saw her eyes glaze over, she turned back and sprinted out of sight back where we came from, her child sprinted in the opposite direction, just went through my legs so fast, and for a few seconds, I stood there in panic. Finally, I decided to follow the defenseless child toward the unknown. Maybe the mother saw something behind me that made her run back, if she just flipped there was only one way for her to go, and I could probably find her more easily.

I don’t know how such a small child disappeared so fast, I kept going and I was on my knees, then on all fours, then army crawling, and started to question if the kid followed the mom and, in the panic before I got confused. Without noticing I was back up, and still moving forward? It was hard to tell, maybe I looped around somewhere. I couldn’t tell the direction I was coming from or going towards, up, down, I kept going because… sinking cost. The corridors were dark and oppressive, so I barely noticed the changes, and besides, I was so tired, and sleepy. I thought maybe the air quality was getting too bad, or maybe there was some gas, I should have gone back, but my tolerance was certainly higher than the kid’s, so I should find him soon. I decided to crawl maybe the kid kept going because the air was better closer to the ground.

I saw a pair of eyes shining in the dark, and the kid came running back to my arms. The child looked sickly again, there was also a little boy and a little girl, who looked even worse. I grabbed the three and ventured back in hopes of finding the woman, or at least getting out of this weird structure and going back to the village. It was hard for me to stay awake, and the kid, I was carrying in my arms, to my chest began dry-heaving. I stopped and tried to soothe the kid. Eventually, he spewed out a few pear-like black gelatinous objects covered in glossy inky slime. The two other children’s demeanor changed, they calmly smiled picked up these “eggs” and walked back toward where I found them. I eventually got out of the ziggurat, then out of the cavern, and I was ushered out of the valley. When I got to the village kid in hand I woke up.

When I awoke, I knew the dream wasn’t over and the next night it continued…