Dark: fragment 2

The Recurring Nightmare.
Vast, empty desert, endless in all directions. Cloudless, yellow sky. No sign of a sun, yet he recalls plenty of brightness.
No vegetation, not even cacti. Sand smooth as silk, hot as lava. Must be searing the soles of his feet, yet, strangely he does not recall a burning sensation.
Noxious, green air. Must be foul smelling, even corrosive to his respiratory tract, yet, strangely he has no recollection of any breathing discomfort.
He instinctively looks toward the horizon, hoping for an end in sight, even if illusory. His eyes seek the thin, hazy line marking ‘up’ from ‘down’. He finds none.
An endless world of dubious physics, justified by the in-built logic of all dreams. His questions have been made redundant even before he could ask them. After all, his mind has an unfair advantage - it knows what he’s thinking.
Lead-soled boots, it proffers. Special respiratory apparatus, it reasons. Parallax, it shrugs.
It is his own private mental hell.
Suddenly, darkness.
Eyes try to adjust, playing games with his mind as they do so. First to disappear is slimy green, then bold yellow, and finally blazing red. Enter blue, then black, then that eerie shade known simply as Night. Rods-reduced, Cones-colour, they taught him at school. Both seem not quite up to this task. Or maybe just unwilling to cooperate.
Sand blows around in small, crazy spirals. Seems to metamorphose into solid shapes, then back into being animated grains of sand.
Did he just see a tree turn into spirals of sand?
Did he see a dog disintegrating into a million particles that vanish into the nearby dune?
Did he just see the silhouette of a dark man in a cape, melting into a…
No.
That is indeed a man he saw.
A hefty man. Wearing a cape of some sort. Can’t make out a face, not even outlines of features. The head, under a hat, seems to be turned in his general direction. Can’t be too sure, in this light. When in doubt, assume the worst.
He is scared. Throat parched. Heart racing. Adrenalin rushing.
Fight or flight?
He is never sure who made the call. Or even, indeed, what the call was. All he recalls is starting to walk toward the menacing silhouette.
He still can’t see any better, and yet he is sure the silhouette is looking straight at him now.
He walks at an even, cautious pace, dictated by a fine balance of anger, confusion and fear. He must know who has violated his personal space. Even if this is hell, it‘s his own private hell.
He is now barely a few feet away from the silhouette. He can now see the cape is an overcoat. A dirty shade of green? He isn’t too sure. The shadowy figure is still unmoved, but now he realizes it is not facing him, rather, it is facing the other way. Realizing the error of his initial assumption does not come timely enough. His hand is already raised to meet the silhouette’s shoulder. He makes contact. The shoulder feels strange - harder and warmer than usual. The silhouette turns.
He wakes up to a dark room. As if it is pre-ordained, his eyes meet the bedside clock. Splash of red. Blink. 21:00 in one-inch-tall numerals. That damn blinking colon. That nagging pain in his head that won’t leave him be. Shit. What an hour to wake up. What a city to wake up in. What a life to wade through.