The Art of Dreams
Chapter 1: The Visitor from the Stars
The warm Miami air felt different from the cool breeze Matthew had grown up with in Cali. The city was loud, bustling, and filled with new faces. Yet, in his small bedroom, everything felt eerily quiet. He missed his old home, his school, and most of all, his friends. Drawing was the only thing that made him feel connected to the world he had left behind.
With a few strokes of his colored pencils, he brought his imagination to life. Tonight, he was working on a picture of a tree with a glowing trunk, standing under a starry sky. He liked to think that his drawings were more than just images—they were little doors to the worlds he wished he could explore.
That night, as he was about to sleep, a strange noise came from the backyard. A low, humming sound, followed by a soft thud. Matthew sat up, his heart pounding. He hesitated for a moment before tiptoeing to the window. What he saw made his breath catch in his throat.
A small spaceship, barely bigger than a car, was half-buried in the grass. Its metallic surface shimmered under the moonlight, pulsing faintly as if alive. Smoke curled from its side, and sparks flickered near a broken panel. Something—or someone—was inside.
Matthew’s legs moved before his mind could catch up. He grabbed a flashlight and rushed downstairs, careful not to wake his parents. Slipping through the back door, he approached the strange vessel with cautious curiosity. The hum of alien technology buzzed in the air.
Then, the hatch opened.
A figure emerged, tall and slender, its skin a luminous shade of blue-silver. Its eyes, large and violet, reflected the stars above. It looked at Matthew, then at its ship, before turning its gaze back to the boy. For a long moment, neither of them spoke. Then, in a soft, melodic voice, the being spoke.
“I am Zyron,” it said. “I need your help.”
Matthew’s heart pounded, but not with fear. With excitement. For the first time since leaving his home, he felt like something truly extraordinary was about to happen.
Over the next few days, Matthew and Zyron worked together in secret. They scavenged for materials in the garage, the attic, and even the junkyard at the edge of town. Each night, they carefully repaired the ship, and with every passing hour, their bond grew stronger.
One evening, as they rested beside the glowing ship, Zyron watched Matthew sketch in his notebook. “You create worlds with your hands,” the alien observed.
Matthew looked up, surprised. “Yeah, I guess I do.”
“What if you could enter them?” Zyron asked, a mischievous glint in his violet eyes.
Matthew frowned. “What do you mean?”
Zyron reached into a compartment on his suit and pulled out a small, shimmering device. “With this, I can modify the way your mind perceives reality. It will allow you to step into your drawings—to interact with them as if they were real.”
Matthew’s heart raced. “You’re saying… I could go inside my drawings? Like, actually be there?”
Zyron nodded. “Yes. But only temporarily. It is an advanced technique, rarely granted to outsiders.”
Matthew’s eyes sparkled with excitement. He thought about all the adventures he could have—the places he could explore. It was beyond anything he had ever imagined.
“I want to try it,” he said firmly.
Zyron placed the device in Matthew’s hand. “Then let us begin.”
As the days passed, Matthew discovered just how incredible Zyron’s technology was. The first time he stepped into one of his drawings—a vibrant jungle filled with towering trees and glowing rivers—he felt an overwhelming rush of wonder. The textures, the sounds, even the scents were exactly as he had imagined them.
He met the creatures he had designed, spoke with the characters he had drawn, and ran through landscapes that had once been confined to the pages of his sketchbook. But more than anything, he realized he was no longer alone. Zyron had given him a gift beyond his wildest dreams.
One night, as they sat outside near the repaired ship, Matthew asked, “Where do you come from, Zyron?”
The alien gazed at the sky. “My home is light-years away, a planet called Xyphos in the Pegasus galaxy. It is a world of luminous cities, floating rivers, and endless knowledge. But it is also… lonely. My people do not experience emotions as you do. They see connection as a distraction.”
Matthew tilted his head. “But you don’t think that way, do you?”
Zyron hesitated, then shook his head. “No. That is why I left. To learn, to feel, to experience what the universe has to offer. And now, I have found something I never expected. A friend.”
Matthew smiled. “Me too.”
For the first time since arriving in Miami, Matthew felt truly understood.
The final night before Zyron’s departure arrived. The ship was fully repaired, its engines humming softly as it prepared for launch. Matthew stood beside it, feeling a lump form in his throat. “Do you really have to go?”
Zyron placed a hand on Matthew’s shoulder. “My journey is not over. But neither is yours. You have a gift, Matthew. And now, you have a way to share it.”
He handed Matthew a small crystal, glowing softly in the palm of his alien hand. “With this, you will always be able to enter your drawings. And maybe, just maybe, we will meet again.”
Tears welled in Matthew’s eyes, but he nodded. “Promise?”
Zyron smiled. “Promise.”
With a final glance, Zyron stepped into his ship. The engines roared, a bright beam of light shot toward the sky, and in a blink, he was gone.
Matthew held the crystal tightly, staring at the stars. He knew this was not the end. It was only the beginning.
And with that, his adventure had truly begun.
Chapter 2: Worlds Beyond Paper
The days following Zyron’s departure felt strange for Matthew. The routine of school, homework, and family dinners seemed monotonous compared to the great adventure he had lived. Every night, as he closed his eyes, he hoped to hear the sound of the spaceship returning. But the sky remained silent.
However, Zyron had left him something: the crystal. Matthew treasured it, carefully placing it on his desk next to his sketchbook. He hadn’t tried using it yet. Part of him feared that it wouldn’t work, that everything had been a dream. But more than that, he feared the opposite: that it would work too well and take him to unknown places.
One afternoon, after finishing his homework, Matthew sat in front of his sketchbook and started drawing. He sketched towering mountains, a glowing river, and a sky with two suns. His hand moved on its own, as if the drawing came to life in his mind before being transferred to the paper. When he finished, he stared at it for a moment. Then, with trembling hands, he took the crystal and held it over the drawing.
The air in the room seemed to shift. A faint vibration ran through his fingers, and suddenly, a soft blue light enveloped the paper. Matthew felt a pull in his stomach, as if he were falling, but before he could react, everything around him disappeared.
When he opened his eyes, he was no longer in his room. He was standing on a hill of soft grass, looking at an impossible horizon. Two suns shone above, casting golden light over the landscape. The river he had drawn flowed to his right, its surface shimmering with silver and blue tones.
“This is incredible,” he whispered.
He ran his fingers through the grass. It was real. Not just a drawing, but a living world.
A sound in the distance made him turn. From the nearby forest, a creature he had not drawn came running. It looked like a deer, but with translucent fur and antlers that glowed like stars. Matthew gasped. How was this possible? If he hadn’t drawn it, did that mean these worlds had a life of their own beyond what he imagined?
He stepped forward slowly, not wanting to scare the creature. But just as he extended his hand, something changed. An invisible force pulled him backward, and the world began to fade.
Matthew opened his eyes suddenly, gasping. He was back in his room, sitting on the floor with the crystal still in his hand. His heart pounded in his chest.
“It worked,” he whispered, looking at his drawing. But now there was something else: a small mark on the paper, like a shadow where the deer had been.
He couldn’t believe it. He could enter his drawings… and they could change while he was inside.
Excitement filled him with energy. He couldn’t keep this to himself. What if other kids could do it too? What if he could share his worlds?
But before thinking about that, there was something else he had to do: explore.
Matthew spent the following weeks traveling inside his drawings. Every day after school, he made sure he was alone in his room, took his crystal, and immersed himself in a different world. He discovered underwater kingdoms, floating cities, and forests where the trees sang with the wind. Each experience was more astonishing than the last.
But he also noticed something unsettling.
There was something in his drawings that he didn’t remember creating. Strange figures in the shadows, whispers in languages he didn’t understand. At first, he thought it was just his imagination, but then something happened that left him frozen.
One night, while exploring a crystal cave in one of his drawings, he saw a silhouette move at the end of the tunnel. It wasn’t one of his creations. Slowly, he stepped forward, his heart pounding.
“Hello?” he called.
The shadow moved. Then, a familiar voice responded.
“Matthew.”
A chill ran down Matthew’s spine. He recognized that voice. He turned slowly and saw Zyron standing at the cave entrance.
“Zyron!” he shouted, running toward him. “You came back!”
The alien nodded, but his expression wasn’t the same as before. There was something in his gaze, a deep concern.
“Matthew, we have a problem,” Zyron said. “You are not alone in these worlds. And something is watching you.”
Matthew’s heart raced. “What do you mean?”
Zyron looked around before answering. “Since you started using the crystal, an unknown entity has begun to manifest in these worlds. It doesn’t belong to your creations and seems to be learning from you.”
Matthew shivered. “Learning from me? How?”
“Every time you travel, you leave traces in your drawings. You’ve noticed it yourself,” Zyron explained. “At first, they were just shadows, small changes. But now it’s getting stronger. It wants to communicate with you.”
Matthew swallowed hard. “Is it dangerous?”
Zyron didn’t answer immediately. “I don’t know. But we need to find out before it crosses the barrier between your imagination and reality.”
Matthew looked at his crystal. Until now, he had only seen it as a gift, a doorway to adventure. But now he understood that it was something more. Something powerful. And something was trying to take advantage of it.
In the following days, Matthew and Zyron began investigating. Together, they explored Matthew’s worlds, searching for signs of the entity. They discovered inscriptions on cave walls, words they didn’t understand but that seemed directed at him.
One night, Matthew drew a desert landscape with golden dunes and a crimson sky. When he entered, it felt different from the other worlds. The air vibrated with strange energy.
“It’s here,” Zyron whispered.
Suddenly, the sand began to shift. In front of them, a figure appeared. It was unlike anything Matthew had ever drawn. Its shape was constantly changing, its outline seemed made of floating ink. It had no face, but Matthew felt its gaze directly in his mind.
“Who are you?” he asked, his voice trembling.
The figure didn’t speak. But in his mind, Matthew heard a response.
“I am what you created without realizing it.”
Matthew’s stomach tightened. Had he given life to something without meaning to? He looked at Zyron, who also seemed surprised.
“We need to understand it before it’s too late,” Zyron said.
Matthew nodded, never taking his eyes off the strange entity.
It had started as a simple game, a wonderful gift. But now, his drawings were more than just imagination. And what was inside wanted to get out.
Chapter 3: The Creation Awakens
The presence before them pulsed with an eerie energy, its form constantly shifting like ink dissolving in water. Matthew clutched the crystal tightly, his breath shallow. Zyron stepped forward cautiously, his glowing eyes analyzing the entity’s unstable form.
“It says I created it… but I don’t remember ever drawing something like this,” Matthew whispered.
The entity remained silent, though Matthew felt its presence pressing against his mind, a wordless message trying to reach him. Zyron extended a hand toward it, but as soon as his fingers got close, the creature recoiled violently. The sand beneath them rippled, and the sky darkened, as if the world itself was reacting to the creature’s emotions.
“We have to leave,” Zyron said urgently.
Before Matthew could protest, the force that had pulled him out of his drawings before activated once again. His vision blurred, the desert landscape vanishing in a swirl of golden sand and crimson sky.
Matthew jolted awake in his room, the crystal glowing faintly in his palm. He gasped for air, disoriented, his heart racing. Zyron stood beside him, his luminous skin dimmed, his expression tense.
“What was that?” Matthew asked, still shaken.
“It’s more than just a presence. It’s evolving, growing stronger every time you enter your worlds,” Zyron said gravely. “It’s feeding on your imagination.”
Matthew swallowed hard. “But why? What does it want?”
Zyron looked at the sketchbook lying open on Matthew’s desk. “We need to understand its nature before it breaks free. If it does… it won’t be confined to your drawings anymore.”
The thought sent a chill through Matthew’s spine. His worlds had always been a refuge, a place of creativity and escape. But now, something had taken root inside them, something that wasn’t supposed to exist.
“We need to go back,” Matthew said, determination hardening his voice. “We need to face it.”
Zyron studied him for a moment before nodding. “Then we prepare.”
For the next few days, Matthew and Zyron planned carefully. Matthew drew landscapes intentionally, testing if he could control what appeared in his worlds. But no matter how much detail he put in, the entity always found a way to be there. Sometimes it was just a shadow behind a tree, other times a ripple in the sky, but it was watching.
One evening, Matthew sketched something different. Instead of a landscape, he drew a door—tall, ornate, glowing at the edges. A gateway. If the entity had come from his imagination, maybe he could control how to meet it on his terms.
Zyron studied the drawing. “You believe you can contain it?”
Matthew took a deep breath. “I have to try.”
He gripped the crystal, activating its glow. The paper shimmered, and within seconds, they were no longer in Matthew’s room.
The air inside the new world crackled with electricity. The door Matthew had drawn stood before them, its golden frame pulsating like a heartbeat. Zyron and Matthew exchanged a look before stepping forward.
As soon as they crossed the threshold, the world around them shifted. They were in a vast void, neither light nor darkness, just an endless expanse. The entity waited in the center, its form more defined now—taller, more humanoid, though still shifting, unstable.
“You created me,” the voice echoed in Matthew’s mind. “You gave me life. But you do not know me.”
Matthew hesitated, gripping Zyron’s arm. “Then show me.”
The entity trembled. And then, the void changed.
Scenes flickered around them—memories of Matthew’s childhood, his old home in Cali, the day he left, the loneliness in Miami. His drawings, his longing for connection, his need for something familiar. The entity had been born from all of it, a subconscious manifestation of his deepest feelings.
“You are… part of me,” Matthew realized aloud.
“Yes. But I am incomplete.”
The words struck Matthew deeply. He had spent so much time creating, imagining, filling his worlds with wonder. But he had also poured his solitude into them, and somehow, this entity had emerged, seeking to become whole.
“How do we fix this?” Matthew asked.
Zyron watched in silence as the entity extended a hand. “You must finish what you started.”
Matthew took a shaky breath. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a pencil. If this was truly a part of him, then he could give it what it needed—a place, a purpose.
With careful strokes, he began to draw. He gave the entity form, features, identity. No longer a shifting shadow, but something real, something whole. As the lines connected, the void around them started to change, reshaping into a new world—one filled with color and warmth.
The entity—no, the person—looked at Matthew with something like gratitude. “Now I am.” It stepped back into the world Matthew had created, blending into the scene like it had always belonged.
Matthew and Zyron stepped away from the drawing, back in his room. The sketch on his desk had changed. No longer an ominous shadow, but a figure standing tall beneath the twin suns of Matthew’s favorite world.
Zyron exhaled, his glow returning to normal. “You did it.”
Matthew smiled. “I didn’t erase it. I gave it a home.”
The crystal in his hand pulsed softly, as if in approval.
The days that followed were different. Matthew no longer felt fear when he entered his worlds. Instead, he felt a deep connection, knowing that everything inside them was a reflection of himself, both his dreams and his struggles.
Zyron prepared to leave once again, but this time, Matthew didn’t feel sadness. “Will I see you again?” he asked.
Zyron smirked. “The universe is vast. But I have a feeling our paths will cross again.”
Matthew watched as the ship ascended into the night sky, disappearing among the stars. He clutched the crystal, knowing that his adventure was far from over.
Because now, he was not just a dreamer. He was a creator.
And his story was just beginning.
