The first nightmare
On the night of the fourteenth of november, it came to be that six human beings, with no knowledge of one another, went to sleep. Expecting the calming refuge of their own, valued and undisturbed, lucidly designed dreams. But these six, without exception, expected wrongly. Neither of them anticipated the events that would begin to unravel, beginning with this first nightmare of many to come.
They all regained their senses within the nightmare at roughly the same time. All of them were immediately lucid, so it would become painfully obvious to them that whatever was happening, went not according to plan.
The general area that presented itself to most of them was quite clearly an old, abandoned industrial area turned nightmare: several modern area buildings were spread out evenly, most in a decidedly forsaken state, some outright turned to ruins and rubble. A canal of sorts, easily seventy feet wide, divided the perimeter unevenly, cutting the dreamers off of the bigger part of the complex. Their side of the water only held about one fifth of the complex, including what was clearly a generator building with an attached substation for power distribution in the southwest corner. To its east, next to the river and what seemed to be non-functional floodgates was a smaller building, presumably once responsible for controlling the latter. Just north of that, a cell tower of about 80, maybe 100 feet height stood out. following the canal further north from there, one could see an old, barely stable looking transporter bridge and a severely rusted crane. To the west from this peculiar landmark was a staging area of sorts. A few derelict trucks and broken forklifts next to big, crumbling gates on both buildings implied that the latter were probably meant to be warehouses or storages for something transport-related. Further north from here, two large buildings of no obvious function slowly and silently decayed away. The entire area was surrounded completely by a chain-linked fence with barbed wire perched like the figurative cherry on top, but everything beyond the fence was mysteriously 'empty' anyway, taking away all incentive to explore beyond. 'Empty' describing a whole landscape full of dust and dried gras. Even the road leading to the west staging area mysteriously faded into nothing right outside the complex.
From this side of the canal, one could see several other, even larger buildings on the far side. But nothing was quite as oppressive and eye-catching as the overwhelming, outright gigantic building towering ominously above all else like a dark gray monolith. There was no telling what this building was meant to be, but it was obviously the metaphorical heart of the complex. That is, assuming that the architecture of this place indeed followed logical principles.
Dewey, the bite-sized sorcerer, found himself in some sort of basement. The dim light of an ongoing nightfall shone in through light wells here and there, allowing him to identify this part of the building as some sort of archive - dusty folders were stacked on top of boxes full of more dossiers on top of shelves holding even more folders. Searching them would reveal shiploads of redacted and blacked-out transport manifests and production reports. Stairs would eventually lead him up into the ground floor of an office building of sorts. Luckily, little Dew was blessed with his trademark sorcerer robe, and whatever else magical equipment he could possibly ask for, hopefully giving him the bravery needed to push onwards and explore this place.
But he was not alone in this part of the complex. Robin manifested dangerously high up on the rickety balconies of the second floor. While this outlook gave him a pretty wide vista of this side of the canal, the view through the smudgy windows was more interesting. Not only did it reveal cubicles and desks of an office area, it also represented his only safe way off these balconies, as there were no ladders or other non-lethal paths to be seen. While he would find a lot of data up here as well, these files too would be mostly useless import/export reports with redacted key data. Schmelzers slightly unsettling appendages were both in place and obeying his orders as usual, so at least he wouldn't choke himself or unwillingly jump off his perch yet.
Anya didn't draw the lucky straw. She essentially came to her senses being stuck between two severely reeking dumpsters filled with unspeakable and thankfully unidentifiable trash. Someone of her dream-like bodily strength would have no problems pushing one of the dumpsters away. Incidentally, the back alley she found herself in was directly behind the office/archive building Robin probably noisily jumped through a window of, by now. If not, she might even find herself in a position to laugh at his awkward situation.
A bit further south (read: quite a bit further south), Finn would wonder why he was sitting in a car that was practically half-buried in a rubble-avalance that presumably once belonged to the adjacent buildings roof. In fact, it seemed as if the car crashed into the debris that now blocked the northern path from here completely, but he would find no wounds implying an actual accident on his body. His lucky charm, the psychic teddy bear evidently survived the incident as well, sitting on the passenger seat and staring at him expectingly. Further down south from here, he would find more cars, as if this side of the building was once used as a parking lot. Of course, none of these were still functional.
Inside the generator building, gambler girl Saniya came to life. The inside of a mostly decrepit generator station certainly wasn't the most welcoming of sights, but unless she had some sort of generator-phobia, she would have little problem finding that the doors of the windowless - and thus pitch black - building were unlocked. She would still be able to lower the probability of hitting her toes on the way out of this darkness, so these bones were safe for the time being.
Shin the raver had probably the most peculiar starting position. He was half-sitting, half in nap position right at the edge of the canal. He was holding on to the cell tower with one hand to prevent himself from taking an unintentional bath. Yet, one of his feet was casually dangling over the edge, with the water being close enough to get his toes wet. While wearing shoes. Truly a cruel fate, as even his fully functional glow-thread could not prevent that awkward wet-toes-feeling.
Lastly, a shadowy figure observed their baby steps from the other side of the canal. It was barely visible if one was to pay close enough attention to the shadows next to the southern-most building just across the water.
