Daniel Kieth

Daniel Kieth walked into the Midway City History Museum, looking down in the dumps. The young man, a rather pale fellow with black-dyed hair and equally dark clothes, wasn’t really looking for anything to see, or do. Today was _supposed _to be a good day for Daniel, ‘Danny’ to his friends, as he had been planning on taking the trip to here with his girlfriend, Melanie. Well, “ex-girlfriend”, now that she had told him she was moving to Dallas to take up a position as Editorial Assistant for some book publisher, and she “wanted to see other people.” Ugh, the malarkey.

But yeah, Danny was heartbroken and disparaged, not to mention down $20 bucks, given the tickets. He had bought two of them, so why not at least use one? And maybe it would get his mind off of… her. It wasn’t working all that well. This was where she wanted to go, not him. History wasn’t all that exciting to him, at least not in the artifacts and ledgers these kinds of places usually held. Danny was more of a cerebral, artistic mind, preferring paintings or music that would usually be in a, well, Art Museum. He began drudging along, walking through, trying to get his moneys worth.

Eventually, Daniel Kieth found himself in an exhibit dedicated to the superheroes of the 1940’s, specifically the team of the Justice Society of America. They bore a little more interest to him, although not much. It wasn’t until he found himself in a section dedicated to one of the oldest heroes, Wesley Dodds aka The Sandman, that he was actually intrigued. Danny was a student of Oneirology, the study of dreams. For some reason he’d always been fascinated by them, their meanings, how they worked, how they just… were. And so seeing a hero using the moniker of the Dream-King of lore, even using a dust akin to the old fairy tales, well that just made Daniel fascinated. He read through the little placards of the exhibit, until he came onto one.

“MATERIOPTIKON: JEWEL OF THE SANDMAN: Fragment of crystal found on The Sandman’s (Wesley Dodds) coat after retirement and donation. Believed to be a shard of the Materioptikon, reported “Dream-King” treasure. Reportedly also owned by Doctor Destiny (John Dee.)”

Below this sign was a small sliver of what looked to be… ruby? No, the color didn’t match. It was richer in shine, more beautiful, and more elegant than anything Daniel Kieth had ever seen in his life. The more he saw of it, the more it seemed to take over everything else. In his peripheral view the world began to blend into beautiful colors, an array of light that could never be compared to any other thing. It was hypnotizing him, stealing him away from the real world, into a dreamy trance when-

“Hey bub, time to go.” Reality snapped back to Daniel Kieth, he suddenly became aware again of his surroundings, the museum. A guard was standing in front of him, looking annoyed. “You hear me, the museum’s closing for the night. Go home.”

Danny simply nodded and headed out, plagued by questions of what had happened, compounded by the fact that afternoon had seemed to turn into night. He drudgingly walked through the city streets, eventually landing at his apartment building, where he went up the steps, down the hallways, and eventually putting himself into his current home. It didn’t feel like home anymore, not since Melanie had taken her stuff out of there when she moved. But he wasn’t thinking about her right now. Danny wasn’t thinking at all, and he went to his bed, not even bothering with removing his clothes. And the moment he laid his head down onto the pillow he was out cold, asleep, and falling into the dreamland.

But it wasn’t his own.