A haunted house. Alone. A basketball court, with a game going... random enough? Yeah, it happens. During the game, one of the 'hallways' led to a haunted house for some reason. I was dared to go up the stairs in the haunted house by some classmates. Everything is black, white, and grey. There is no sound. Every flight of stairs I take, I feel more and more uneasy. Every time I reach the top of a flight of stairs, there's an old, wooden door. Open it, and it turns into a room that's identical to the one on the floor below. It's like a never-ending staircase. Before I get to what I assume t be the last flight, something tells me to not finish it. Something in my actual subconscious. I realize that I did not like where this dream was headed, and I knew something bad would be waiting for me. I begin heading back down the stairs, feeling really uneasy, and while on the way down, force myself to wake up.

Same setting. This time, started on the stairs, faced with the last set of stairs. Not wanting to finish the climb, I still somehow find myself at the top of the stairs. There are people there, but I don't recognize any of them. We were all brought here for the same reason. I don't know why, but the number twenty seemed to fit the number of people in that room. One by one, people started disappearing. If you've played Oblivion, it's like the quest for the Dark Brotherhood you do, the one where you're locked inside the house and you have to kill the guests, that's the sort of feel I and the other people there were getting. After a while, the rest of us began running down the stairs, trying to make it to the bottom floor, out of the house. To safety. It wasn't long before I realized by the time we reached to bottom, it was only me that was left. At least, that was human. There was an overly ominous shadow looming nearby that caused me to freeze in terror. It started moving towards me, but before it could reach me, I was able to wake up.

Back to the very top, with the 'guests.' This time, the people are in color. I remember a few of the people very clearly; a lady wearing a pink, polka-dotted dress and curly blond hair, with a pearl necklace; extremely cliche. A young boy that had old Justin Bieber-like black hair, and was a little on the heavy side. A young gentleman, perhaps in his 20s; short brown hair, lightish blue t-shirt, jeans. I can't remember the rest, but I knew there were a number of children involved, as well as some black people. We realized what was going on; we didn't have anything to combat whatever entity it was that haunted us. We made a break for the stairs yet again, this time working together. Every flight, there would be one less person. The young boy with the Bieber-like hair was the first to disappear, from what I remember. Then, on the fourth floor, I believe, the shadow that had made me freeze in terror the last time I had this dream, made its presence known. It went for the cliche-looking blond girl, and we watched it mutilate her in front of us. We couldn't really see what the shadow was, because it was so dark in some parts of the room, it just blended in. As she was tossed around like a ragdoll and poked like a pin cushion, her blood stained the floor and the walls; as it did so, a few colors began to emerge, hence why I remember the colors of the few people I did remember. Despite the rest of the room being darker than it was the previous time, I could clearly see how blond her hair was, how pink and white her polka-dotted dress was... and how deep red her blood was. The gentleman urged us on; there were three of us left. The next flight, a girl I don't remember very well--dark hair and glasses, I think?--was the next victim. Her death, if it was shown, is not something I remembered. Then we got to the bottom of the stairs. At this point, I had forgot what it even looked like, because y'know, 8+ years since the beginning of this damn dream. But I stepped out onto a court; dazed and confused, I looked around. There was no one in the stands. No one on the court. As the gentleman behind me emerged, he let out a pained yelp, and as I shot my gaze back toward him, he was sucked back into the shadows, and then there was dead silence. I turned back around and came face-to-face with three black officials; triplets, if you will. Calling them black would be an understatement; I knew they were not... normal. This time, instead of freezing up like my terrified pre-teen self did, I was able to react as they lunged for me. They sort of chuckled and I don't know if they spoke or projected words into my head, but I realized that, to end this nightmare, I had to surpass them in a game of basketball. As lame as it sounds, yes, that's what I had to do. If you've seen Luck of the Irish, it was sort of like that. Except, I was fighting for more than just my life and freedom--I was fighting for the freedom of the other people trapped in this nightmare. And as it goes, I somehow, for a split second, realized that this was a dream, and managed to treat it like Michael Jordan did in Space Jam in the way that I imagined I could do anything, and scored a basket. However, I soon realized that was not the true goal. Quickly getting the ball again, I noticed a hidden basket above the original, and scored in that goal. The three triplet officials did not seem satisfied; agitated and irritated, mostly, as they quickly disappeared and were replaced suddenly by a roaring crowd, flashing lights from cameras, and air horns as a crowd that had not been there a second ago, was now there. Not only that, but from the hallway came a parade of people. Those people, I realized, were people that had been in that haunted house with me. They treated it like it was nothing and they were just there to congratulate me on 'winning the big game,' but as I walked past the boy with the Bieber-like hair, I overheard him talking about the house.
"Yeah, so, *insert name I cannot remember* wanted to move over a bit, because her torso was on top of me, but she couldn't, because, y'know, we were dead," he'd said. And with that, he shot me a wicked glance. His eyes were deep voids of nothingness, and as his group of friends around him laughed at the apparent joke, I came to the realization that this was a dream again, and one I'd had before, and woke up.