I started out driving along Berry Farm Road heading towards Woodrow Wilson Parkway near Staunton, VA. I turned Right on Woodrow Wilson Parkway and I was looking at a map to try to figure out how to get to Aunt Irene's house. I was supposed to turn left at "Ng Road" (pronounced "ing"), which was supposed to be the second stop light, but when I got to that light, I saw it was labeled "Aurora Drive", so I thought my directions were wrong. I continued driving straight to look for a place to turn around so I could go back and look again for Ng Road.
I was in this small town like area, and I had to get all the way through it before finding a place to turn around. I turned left and went into a huge parking garage. This parking garage was really big. The area that I pulled in to was about 50 feet tall and looked like an old castle. There were a number of passages leading away from the area I was in, but they were all blocked with gates or bars. I pulled across the far side and stopped in front of the gate that was there and got out of my car. The whole area was a solid gray color, except for the bars, which were black.
There was a ramp to my right that went down that had a swing-arm across it like a toll gate. I knew that ramp led out to Interstate 81, but I didn't really want to go back out that far to have to turn all the way back around to get to Aunt Irene's house. I also knew that for some reason, I could not just back out the way I had come in.
There was a car sitting down there in front of the swing-arm waiting to go through, and Sigourney Weaver was there at the automated card/ticket reader trying to get the swing arm to go up so she could drive her car through. She had come around to the back side of the thing and was inspecting it to see what was the matter. She mentioned something to me about how her ID badge was supposed to make it work, but it wasn't opening like it should. While we were standing there, and older lady drove by Sigourney's car and made the gate work and drove out, saying to us as she went out, "It doesn't look like the gate is broken to me." Somehow during this time, I realized that the only people that lived/worked here were women. Men weren't supposed to be admitted at all.
While I knew that if I scanned my card to try to get out of here, the security system of this place would know that there was a man here, but I didn't feel like I had any other choice. I went back over to the gate in front of my car and kind of waved my ID badge in front of it. It beeped and clicked open, but only enough for me to walk through. I couldn't drive my car out.
Beyond this gate, it was like I was in a tower that was about 30 feet across. A staircase ran around the perimeter of it to the right and went down. I wound up following this set of stairs down and came to an area that was like a mostly-deserted back office type of area. It was still all gray and made of stone/cement, but there was a light on at the end of the hall and on the right.
I went down the hallway, which had picnic tables in the middle and running the length of it, and I turned and went into the office. Aunt Irene was there, and it was her office. She was finishing up a few things and wouldn't be able to leave for about a half an hour. She told me that Sean and Nicole (cousins), Nicole's husband Adam, my mom and my brothers would be there. She also said that Bryan would be there with his wife. (in waking life I would actually expect that to be my unmarried cousin Brian, but instead it was Bryan, the maintenance guy from work, and also not married in waking life)
By this point we had made our way back out into the hallway and were standing by some of the tables. Mom and my brothers were already there, but I don't think Sean ,Nicole and Adam were. Then Bryan walked in from the right with his wife and greeted us all. His wife was a little older and had blond hair that was one length down to the top of her neck. She spoke warmly and with a very distinct accent (possibly Polish or Russian) and I think she was saying that she was looking forward to seeing all of us at Aunt Irene's house. Then those that were sitting got up, and saying goodbye to Aunt Irene (because she still had work to do) we started walking to leave.
We were all going down this long hallway that seemed very open, almost as if it were a bridge. We were just talking while looking for an exit. While we were on our way, I came to this area that had bars across it (much like in the first area of the garage I had entered) but the bars were open. I walked through and stepped onto this thing that looked like a metal grate that had been rubberized with red rubber. It was supposed to be big enough to hold a car because it was actually made for transporting cars around, but it wound up being only about four feet across and seven feet long. As I stepped onto it, someone said something about how you could ride this grating and find your lost car, because evidently this happened all the time around here.
Once I got onto the grating, it started to move. I was in another tower like area, and the grating moved around the perimeter of it in a clockwise direction (again, to the right) and went downwards into the basement level. I knew I was finally getting to the main office area and I'd hopefully be able to find my car and get out of here.
Once I got to the bottom I stepped off the grate and looked around. This whole area was brightly lit, and there were lots of wood and plastic surfaces mixed in with the concrete and stone I had been seeing previously. The whole area was bustling with women working this office. The area was open off to my left, and a wall with several doors and a water fountain was on my right. In front of me was a counter/table that was very large. It was about twelve to fifteen feet square, and the women sitting at the other side were on the phone and very busy. Many of the women here were very large, looking like they weighed more than 250 pounds. Most were older women, and everyone was very loud. They were yelling into phones and yelling at each other, not in an irate way, but just because they felt they needed to yell to be heard.
I tried to get the attention of one or two of the women across the table from me because I wanted to know where my car was and how to get out. A younger woman to my left noticed me and was also trying to get their attention for me. I was grateful because I knew that men weren't supposed to be allowed in here, and the fact that she was trying to help me eased my worry about being there and upsetting everyone. At one point one of the women across the table told us to hold on and she'd get to us when she could, but I knew it was just lip service and she planned to keep ignoring me.
Suddenly there was an extra bit of commotion that came from behind the women at the other side of the table. Someone yelled that the Queen had been dethroned by either choosing to leave or dying. Everyone got suddenly silent, and I realized that everyone around here answered to the Queen. The same person yelled that they needed someone to be the new Queen. To my surprise, no one piped up and offered.
I saw my chance. I rose my hand, and everyone in the place turned and looked at me. I said in kind of a sheepish way, "I'll be the new Queen." It was done. None of them had spoken up, so I suddenly had the power just by saying so. Everyone was in utter surprise that a man had suddenly become their queen.
Suddenly everyone was attending to me. I told the women that had been on the phone that I wanted to see where in the building I had tried to use my ID card. I knew that this would tell me where my car was, but I didn't want to tell them I was looking for my car.
I realized that as soon as I left, they were going to be without a queen again, and if no one spoke up, then they would never have a queen to tell them what to do. While the two women were busy looking in the computers to see where my ID card had been tried, I was thinking that there had to be a young woman there who wanted to be queen and could do a great job but was too shy to take the position for herself. If it were given to her instead, she would make a great queen. I think I was thinking of the woman that had helped me with trying to get the attention of the two women originally, but I didn't see her anywhere, and I was worried that I wouldn't be able to pass on the queenship to her.
Finally the women located where my ID card had been used, and I asked them to take me there right away. I went around the big table and there was a hallway to the right. I followed them, but I was still thinking of how I was going to find the other woman to make her queen before I left.
While I was thinking about this, I lost track of the two women that were leading me. I could still hear their footsteps and their voices, but I couldn't tell exactly where they had gone. They could have either gone straight along the hallway that were were already traveling in, or they could have taken a left and gone up a flight of stairs. I felt two things here: I felt that they had gone up the steps, AND I felt that they had split up, but continued talking, and one had gone down the hallway and one had gone up the stairs. I was starting to think that they may have done this on purpose to confuse me because they didn't like that I was the queen now, but before I could make a decision to go one way or another, my alarm went off and woke me up.
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