Exhausted from the entire day's affairs, David laid down in bed to go to sleep. He had woke up early to move apartments, participated in a full contact spar, taken part in some weird testing, spent a long time in the car, got to visit with his parents, fought and killed a group of 15 assailants, and made up with Karine. This was all in one day. Even though he was physically and mentally tired, he had tons of work left to do in his sleep.

For the first few minutes of sleep, David did not focus in on any of the dream orbs. He simply sat in the darkness and tried to recuperate for a few minutes. Today had been a long day. David started to feel better. It was time to get to work.

First was deal with the information given to him by Grover.

Based on David's interrogation results, the "boss" that the guy had referred to was one of Karine's guards, Charles. David had met Charles several times and he had always seemed like an okay guy. Based on what Grover had told David, the plan was for the group to kidnap Karine and use her as a bargaining chip to get into The Other. Because Charles is one of Karine's bodyguards, he would help be spared with Karine when the group attacked and killed everyone else. They would then request safe passage to The Other. Their bet was that William Carmine would allow their passing under the condition that they release Karine with Charles as an escort once they arrived in The Other. Once in The Other, the idea was that they would not hold to the previous agreement and take Karine to a rival family to be used a bargaining tool to seek asylum. David thought it was a pretty naive plan which showed some level of desperation and idiocy. Why were they so desperate to get to The Other?

Since David and Karine had reconciled their issues, he wanted to help get rid of this threat for her. Plus, Charles' people had tried to kill him twice. And threatened to kill his parents. David's anger flared with the thought of it all. With a bit of mental focus, David began searching through the orbs.

After a few attempts, he found the one that belonged to Charles. From what David knew, Charles is a peak Class A Warrior. The highest level people David had tried this on was the previous group that were an assorted group of Class B's. David was certain that he could pull off his plan though. When David looks into the orb, he had to laugh. The slightly overweight Charles is lecturing the group of men that David had killed earlier.

"This guy must be so pissed off that they didn't show up that he is dreaming about it. I'm actually surprised he could even sleep. Thinking about it, he has to believe that they just didn't show up. Who would know that I had showed up and killed them all," David thought to himself with a bit of humor to his thoughts.

He still didn't get the reason for it all. From his interrogation of Grover, David had found a little. Although he was a main guard, Mr. Carmine hadn't given him the opportunity to visit The Other for adventure. He was stuck on baby sitter duty because he wasn't that talented and his physical defense was near the middle at his level of the organization. David didn't have understanding of how the man could lead so many to their death with such a small matter. Why didn't he just work a little harder and try to get his chance? Why did the other guys actually follow him for a chance at going to The Other?

Regardless, they had all crossed David by threatening people that David cares about. David knew that he would eventually kill the man, but he couldn't do it now. That would ruin his time at home. Having someone die always ruined the mood. David was thinking of how to resolve this issue as soon as possible, but preserve his time at his parent's house. After thinking over the situation, he realized he had an option that might work....maybe he could just lock Charles in sleep so he couldn't wake up.

With that idea, David proceeded forward. He wouldn't let Charles off easily. He would make him be stuck in a never ending nightmare. Using his newly realized powers in the dream world, David touched the orb and began modifying the dream into a wonderful nightmare. After making the living hell of a nightmare to his liking, David willed the dream into a perpetual state. Charles was locked in the nightmare.

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After David had dealt with Charles, he decided that it would be appropriate to check out Karine's other guards as well. Surprisingly, the few guards that were sleeping checked out just fine or at least it appeared that way from their sleep. David had modified their dreams slightly as a test of their loyalty and all of them performed well. Especially, the female guard, Heather, whom seemed to have a crush on Karine. The visualizations from viewing that dream were wonderful. No modification needed. David almost wasted the entire night watching, but eventually had to pull himself away.

After he checked out all of the guards, he went to his parents' dreams. His dad was dreaming about work. It was weird and boring. Realizing his dad was a lost cause, David quickly moved on to his mother. Her dreams were the most disturbing of them all. She was sitting in the living room of the house with two kids playing. Karine came in to hand her a cup of coffee and they sat down to talk. It took a minute to realize that apparently in his mom's dream that David and Karine were married and visiting the house with their two kids. Trying to put these two abnormal people's thoughts out of his head, David left from viewing his parents' dreams and went over to Karine's dream orb.

"Maybe she is having some dreams about me?" David thought to himself with a sly grin on his face as he peaked inside of the orb.

Karine really was dreaming about David, but it wasn't the crude dream that David had hoped to see. Karine was shopping for wedding stuff with David in tow. Holding hands, trying on dresses, tasting cakes, affectionate pecks on the cheeks, passionate kissing and little groping when no one else was around, talk of a family together. David was terrified.

"Shit, she is worse than my mom," David though with a shiver as he left the dream.

After that experience, David decided to just safely sit around in the dark of his dream realm until everyone started to wake up. after all, it was very refreshing to mentally dwell in this world of darkness.

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Waking up in the morning, David quickly realized it was a very busy house. A whole group of people were at the kitchen table eating on a heavy helping of food. They looked like they were really enjoying the meal. Karine was standing at the kitchen counter with his mom shuffling around preparing stuff for breakfast.

"Good morning, everyone," David said while staring slack jawed at the crew of guards devouring his mom's home cooked food. There were a few grunts in response to his greeting.

Hearing the new voice in the kitchen, David's mom turned around and said, "Good, you're up. Go check the chicken coop for some more eggs if you want any. These guys can put some food down."

David's mom seemed to be loving the company.

Seeing David turn to walk out of the kitchen, she tapped Karine on the arm and spoke with a devilish smile, "You go to. There are probably a lot of eggs to carry."

David was just going down the front steps to the house when he heard the screen door creak open behind him. He paused in his tracks to wait for Karine as he saw her coming down to meet him.

As she got close, David reached out and grabbed her hand to lead her on the walk. He had learned last night that Karine dreams about these sort of sweet affectionate actions, so he figured why not put the information to good use. Karine smiled and blushed at the gesture and followed alongside David.

"Did you sleep well last night?" David asked in a teasing manner. Remembering her dream, Karine smiled and an even deeper red blush appeared on her face. "Yes," she responded.

"So I guess my mom didn't totally freak out when all these people appeared this morning," David said in a questioning manner while walking.

"No, she knew we were coming. I had called her last night," Karine said before elaborating on the story.

Hearing the tale, David looked at Karine with a surprised face then chuckled, "You two could probably the most dangerous people I know with all that plotting. No wonder my mom started asking me about my plans and how long I was staying all of sudden after dinner."

Seeing Karine's blush intensify to the point that it looked like blood was going to burst out her cheeks, David quickly changed the topic.

"I guess my dad left for work early this morning," David said.

"Yes, he was a little surprised by the number of guards around his house, but he crammed in his breakfast and left for work. He said to tell you bye if he didn't see you before you left," Karine said.

The two continued to chat as they walked across the yard.

Getting close to the chicken coop, David let go of Karine's hand and got to business with the chickens. After a few minutes, both he and Karine had two handfuls of eggs and were headed back to the house.

"What are your plans for today?", David asked as they got close to the house.

"We will probably leave in an hour or two," Karine said. "Everyone wants to get back before night time."

"Lady Karine," one of the guards ran up, "for some reason we can't wake up Charles. He must of had an accident in his cultivation last night. He seems like he is in a coma. We need to bring him back to the estate as soon as possible."

"Oh my, do you think he will be okay? We better hurry back," Karine said in a slight panic.

Seeing that his morning was going to be ruined by his own actions, David quickly followed, "I'm sure he will be okay, Karine. Why don't you stay here with me for a while then we can ride back together? Two guards can take Charles back to Three Rivers City in one car. The other four guards can cram into the other car and me and you can ride back in my truck."

Seeing a hesitation on Karine's face, David continued, "I'd really like to spend some time in the car with you. My mom always said that's how you will know if a relationship will work out good or not. She'd always say "If you can't have a conversation on a long car ride, then how will you deal with years of marriage?" Apparently, her and my dad used to spend hours together driving and she said it never got old."

Since he new that the marriage thought was fresh in her subconsciousness from the dream last night, David knew that this had a good shot of working. After another minute of thought, Karine agreed to David's plan. Karine directed the guards what to do and went back into the house.