The Japan in my mind is scary.

As with most family vacations in the past, an argument is bound to break out. This time we were all trying buy tickets for the Japan Rail and I was having problems getting a receipt to print for mine. My dad gets impatient and we're all exchanging words back and forth. Eventually calming down, he tells us about this one childhood photo that I was in and the story behind it. I don't remember it now, but it was a creepy realization that I was photographed in a very dangerous place. Somehow this led to me wandering off in this Hawaii-esque part of Japan where I could see couples all dressed in black dancing around in big elegant moves. The girls were on one side, the guys on the other.

Then the scene suddenly fades into a superhero movie setting (think Green Lantern, Spiderman combined) and there's this hulk-like figure laying in a bed with these rays of energy circling over him as a protective shield. I see a second being trying to get to the hulky thing, reaching through the energy shield. But when he gets in range of the shield, it sends electricity through his body. This guy, he's not really human and pretty strong. I see him grab the individual rays and rip them off bit by bit. Then I start hearing screams. But they're not coming from Mr Hulk. No. They're coming from the poor humans whose bodies are attached to the ends of each energy ray. Like umbilical cords, the rays grow out from multiple areas on their heads, necks and back. Each tug or pull is like ripping off a scab or stitches from an unhealed wound. Each of those people are an orangey color and they radiate with the energy that's being sucked out of their souls. I can't block out their cries so I shrink into the shadows so they don't see me.

As this fight continues, I look back at the dancing couples. They're finishing the last steps of their dance. The girls spin out and fall down this tube. The guys seem caught off-guard and suddenly they're sucked into a separate tunnel. I don't see where they go, but I start hearing screams. The ones who haven't fallen into the tunnels yet start to panic and try to get away, but it's futile to escape. The tunnels have a vacuum suction turned on and one by one, they are pulled down to the screams.

From where I'm hiding, I see silhouettes of the dancers going through the tubes, flashes of lights and more screaming. Just like the fat kid who drank from the chocolate river in Willy Wonka and fell in and got sucked up in the tube, I watched one of those "bodies" getting squeezed through a tube right in front of me. Whatever it is, it no longer looked human. It was orangey and spongey, like funnel cake or pancakes. Then I see a blue-green eye rolling up at me. It sent chills down my spine. I could see tears welling up and the spongey blob continued on its way to the exit of the tunnel. Those dancers were deformed and fried by the energy rays and made to continue feeding power into that "energy shield" for the Hulk.