The Rantings of Joseph Doan

Note: The following sections are transcriptions of audio cassettes sent to the Third Eye Over Iowa offices over the past few months. They have been sent by a man calling himself Joseph Doan, with no return address given. Along with the first tape was a note as to the nature of the missive. The note is reproduced here.

To Third Eye Editors:

     I am a doctor in western Iowa, and have been able to find no medical or psychological explanation for some very unusual symptoms which afflict me. Once every five weeks, or so, I experience a brief bout of sleeptalking, which does not coincide with my REM sleep, and hence I have no dreams of about which I ramble. These speeches began a few months ago, but only recently did I encourage my wife to record them and send them to your offices. Notice how the rants seem to tell a story sequentially. I am concerned as to what kind of fantasy life is building itself in my brain, and without the aid of medical explanation, I can only hope that you and your readers may be able to shed some light on my situation.

     I shall send cassettes as they are made. If this trend continues, you will receive another cassette in five or six weeks.

     Thank You,

     Joseph Doan

1) Standing on a plain of rocks. Some are as small as my hand. Some are fifty, a hundred yards wide. All flat. The sky is night. The purple lightning sickens me. I float. I float and cannot move.

2) I see the stink-shrubs. They smell like old eggs and slowly, shudderingly writhe. They look for something. I float and drift to some distant horizon. Thunder peals, sounding like whistles at times.

3) Oh God the blood-mist in the sky. I hurtle forward and am afraid it may come for me, the pulsing reddish cloud. Holes appear near and far. The air opens and fluttering things fall out to the rocky plain. They squeal and flop. A stink-shrub grasps for one. I cannot look. I'm falling toward the horizon.

4) Now I see what I am falling towards. Where my floating will take me. A mound. Far, maybe miles. I cannot tell distance here. There are no shadows. A wailing like a baby's scream rings in my ears. The cloud of blood! It swoops down on me and the world goes reddish-pink. Blood gets in my lungs. Choking. My throat tears with screams.

5) The blood cloud is behind me. Exchanges have been made. Now the wailing that reminds me of screaming is louder. The mound is closer. I think there is a cave. My pores throb as I see the plain ripple. It pulses and whispers. My teeth grind with every livid flash of that sickly purple lightning.

6) I see the cave in the mound clearly now. It must be ten miles wide and three tall. Little white specks. They move on top of the cave and across its lip. Lungs getting tight. Cannot see.

7) Vision! The cave entrance! I am on top of the cave and the white things I saw are horrible. Horrible! Part man and part worm and spider, they clamber and jitter idiotically and jabber in scales. They can't go in. I try to shut my eyes. Cannot. Blood from my nose. It feels good to bleed.

8) A spider-thing rubs up against another. It devours it! Gnaws on a living leg. The other shudders but doesn't break away. I must go. Get away. The edge of the cave. I throw myself over and fall to the darkness. Patches of the darkness seem to move somehow. They form obscure patterns. Secret patterns. They hold answers. I fall to them. My bones cry to join them.

Note: This last tape was received in December. We eagerly await future sleeptalking visions from Mr. Doan.