It was a moonlit night. The breeze was swaying the tall pine trees making the scenery look very picturesque. I looked at this peaceful atmosphere for a while and then decided to go to bed. I lay awake for some time and then I entered a world which was unknown to me. It was a beautiful city, like the ones I had seen in some scientific movies. I noticed that everything was artificial. There were no trees, no flowers. The city was lit brightly by an artificial sun.

I found myself lost in this city. Then I saw a group of people coming towards me. They were very gloriously dressed, the women wearing short bright coloured satia skirts with silver cuffs and collars and men wearing long gowns like the ones worn during Elizabethan times. I found it most rediculous, everything was so quaint in this place.

I was very anxious to know Where I was and who they were but I got the answer before they could speak. It seemed there was a mutual understanding between us. They could read my mind and I theirs. The city was under the ocean. I could not imagine such a dazzling city under water. So much advanced in science yet so backward in fashion.

Now the women came towards me, the men stayed behind. The cruel expression on their faces made me terror stricken, I started to run away from them but I did not hear their foot steps following me; so my curiosity got the better of me and I turned back to see. I caught the eye of a woman and to my greatest horror I could not move my limbs. I wondered how I was paralyzed, then I remembered seeing a ray of light coming from the woman's eye. It was this ray of light which had paralyzed me. This ray is yet to be discovered by our world.

The women caught me with their strong muscular hands and directed me into a huge transparent glass ball which looked like a bubble. This vehicle floated lightly, yet so swiftly. It stopped and I was taken out by women who looked like guards to me, and led me into a big stadium.

In the centre of the stadium, there was a huge enlarged brain covered by a glass dome. Instantly I knew this was the ruler of this underwater city. The people of this city were like slaves to this mysterious 'Brain'. They obeyed every order given by the Brain.

I looked around curiously and I gasped when two Robots suddenly appeared before me and took me to a laboratory to transfer me into a masculine female. Now I came to know that the men were the weaker sex in this city. I struggled to get my hands free from the touch of the cold metallic hands but I was powerless.

They made me lie on a metal bed and started preparing for operation, they made every thing ready and came back with metallic rods in their hands, which were throwing out a fiery red flame.

They were about to use them on me; suddenly there was an explosion in the stadium. The Brain had exploded. The Robots and all the machines stopped working. I was free.

I ran out but only to meet a disastrous scene. The people were melting like butter and the whole city was ablaze. I came to know what had caused this destruction-the Nuclear Blast, thrown by the Americans in the Indian Ocean.

I felt myself losing consciousness, then I woke up with a start from this dreadful dream. I was relieved to find myself back in bed.

Nickie Lepcha
Class X