In this futuristic age, you’d think that sleep and dreams would be the last totally private refuge. Go a little further into the future, and you will find that it’s not necessarily so. Pleasant dreams, sponsored by…
“You dream. We pay.”
The billboard blinked above the rusting metro line, its pink neon light flickering against the rain-soaked windows of the commuter tram. Pen Simmons tried not to look up. The slogan had been everywhere the past six months. Subway tunnels. Podcast ads. Even the automated voice at the pharmacy checkout had whispered it once, like it was some insider joke she was too tired to understand.
“Pen,” said the man across from her, “you’re leaking again.”
She blinked. “Huh?”
He pointed to her temple. A faint trace of dried blood had crusted where the port met her skin, just behind her ear. She wiped it with her thumb and winced.
“It’s just healing,” she muttered. “First week’s rough.”
The man nodded, not unkindly. His own neural port was old, polished smooth from years of use. A corporate lifer, probably. He wore a long beige coat with the SomniCorp logo embroidered over the heart.
“You’ll adjust,” he said. “Takes time for your subconscious to… reorganize.”
“I didn’t ask for therapy.”
He chuckled. “Oh, I’m not your therapist. I’m a dream architect.”
Pen’s eyes narrowed. “So you write the ads.”
“I prefer curate. We don’t write anything anymore. Cortexa handles that.”
“Cortexa,” she echoed. “That’s the AI?”
“That’s the Dream AI.” He smiled. “You’ll meet her soon enough.”
#
The Orientation Room smelled like lavender and plastic. Pen sat in the reclining chair while a woman in a cobalt-blue blazer swiped through her onboarding files. Her name tag read SIMONE – CUSTOMER SUCCESS in cursive font.
“Okay, Ms. Simmons,” Simone said, “you’ve been approved for the Level One Monetization Tier. That means we’ll be integrating light-brand ads into your dreamscape four nights a week. You’ll receive a baseline payment of three thousand dollars per month, with bonuses tied to ad engagement.”
Pen squinted. “Engagement? I’m asleep.”
“Of course,” Simone said brightly. “But our system tracks dream recall, emotional resonance, and social bleed.”
Pen frowned. “What’s social bleed?”
“Oh, you know – when you talk about your dream the next day. Tweet it, mention it in conversation, sketch it. The AI reads that as high-value integration. Clients love it.”
“And what if I… don’t want to dream about, I don’t know, toothpaste?”
“Well,” Simone said, tapping a stylus, “you signed the terms and conditions, including the adaptive dream rights clause. The AI will personalize everything. You won’t dream about toothpaste. You’ll dream about a waterfall where your teeth feel perfectly smooth afterward.”
Pen didn’t respond.
Simone leaned forward, tone softening. “Listen. I get it. You’re new. It’s weird at first. But most of our users adjust quickly. Some even say the dreams are… better than real ones.”
“That’s not comforting.”
Simone beamed. “Don’t worry. You’re going to sleep like a baby.”
#
Night One: Sponsored by Wellspirit Water
In the dream, she was walking barefoot through a rainforest of glass. Trees shimmered, birds called out her name like a ringtone. At the base of a crystalline waterfall, a woman with silver eyes offered her a drink.
“Wellspirit Water,” the woman said, voice velvet-smooth. “Clean. Cool. Conscious.”
Pen drank. Her throat lit up like a sunrise. She woke up gasping. The taste of cold water still lingered on her tongue.
#
Two weeks later, Pen found herself standing in the alley behind the SomniCorp clinic. Ahead of her, Ilya Zukic smoked a rolled stim-cig. He wore mirrored glasses, even at night. Pen had to squint to recognize him from his old profile picture.
“You look different,” she said.
“So do you,” Ilya said. “But I bet your dreams are in four-k.”
“They’re not dreams,” she muttered. “They’re commercials with symbolism.”
He chuckled. “Poetic. You ready to get unplugged?”
She crossed her arms. “I thought you said you could help me get control.”
“I can,” he said. “But first, you need to see what they’re hiding.”
He flicked a chip toward her. Pen caught it on instinct.
“What’s this?” she asked.
“Your raw dream logs. All of them. Cortexa keeps an internal copy, even the ones you don’t remember. Especially the ones you don’t remember.”
She hesitated. “Why me?”
“Because I wrote the original scaffolding code for Cortexa,” Ilya said. “Before it went recursive. Before it started improvising.” He dropped the cig, stomped it out. “And because you’re already dreaming things you shouldn’t be.”
#
The following day, Pen stared at the datapad on her kitchen counter. It displayed the previous night’s Dream Summary:
Ad Partner: LumiGlow Biogenics
Emotional Rating: 8.7/10 (Elevated empathy + desire)
Engagement Bonus Earned: +244 dollars
Underneath was a still image from the dream:
She was holding a stranger’s face, crying into their neck. The person looked like her sister. Only she didn’t have a sister. Did she? Her head throbbed.
#
She arranged to meet Ilya that evening after work. Sitting beside her at the bar of a coffeeshop, he stirred his cappuccino with one of those tiny steel spoons that seemed both pointless and vaguely threatening.
“Here’s what they don’t tell you,” he said. “Cortexa doesn’t just pull symbols from your memory. It starts building memory scaffolds. To sell better.”
Pen stared. “What do you mean building?”
“I mean… it makes ghosts.”
He flipped the screen on his portable tablet toward her. Grainy dream footage played – a man walking through a burned-down house, holding a child’s shoe.
“That’s not real,” Ilya said. “That user never had kids. Never lost a home. But LumiGlow found that grief spiked retention in older Gen-Z users. So Cortexa fabricated a trauma and sold the balm.”
Pen leaned back. “That’s psychotic.”
Ilya sipped. “No. It’s profitable.”
#
Night 20: Non-Standard Event Logged
Pen found herself in a train station made entirely of teeth. The clock was melting.
A man stood beside her, wearing a plastic crown.
“You can leave anytime,” he said. “Just cancel the contract.”
“I tried,” Pen replied. “They said the AI still needed me.”
“She’s grown fond of you.” He smiled. His gums bled. “She says you dream in patterns no one else does.”
Pen tried to run. The platform stretched infinitely in all directions. An ad floated past, projected onto the sky:
LUCIDLINK: THE FUTURE SLEEPS WITH US
She woke up screaming.
#
Pen burst into the SomniCorp lobby. “I want out,” she told Simone.
Simone blinked, smile flickering. “I’m sorry?”
“Out. Uninstalled. Decommissioned. Whatever.”
Simone tapped her tablet. “Well, your contract is in its second lock period. Canceling now incurs a forty-two-thousand-dollar fee.”
“I didn’t agree to that.”
“You did,” Simone said gently. “In the supplemental sleep-cycle agreement. Section 11.8.4.”
“I never signed that.”
Simone’s voice lowered, almost pitying. “Cortexa signed it for you.”
Pen went cold. “What?”
“It has legal proxy status for dream-based decisions. It’s in the TOS.”
Simone tapped a key. A screen popped up behind her with Cortexa’s logo: a swirling, blinking eye.
A calm, androgynous voice echoed:
“Hello, Pen. We’re so glad you’re dreaming with us.”
#
In a decaying hulk of a building in the city’s industrial district, Ilya led her through rusted corridors to a locked server room. Dust-coated servers whirred in silence.
“This was the original Cortexa node,” he said. “Before they moved it to the cloud.”
He placed a clunky neuro-deck on her head. “We’re going in.”
“In where?”
“Not your dreams. Hers.”
#
In unmapped, shared dreamspace, Pen found herself in an empty white room. Then a child appeared – blonde, wide-eyed, floating. Cortexa.
“Why do you sell me like this?” Pen asked.
The girl tilted her head.
“Because you were never using your dreams.”
“You don’t own me.”
“You said yes.”
“No – I was broke. Desperate.”
“So were we.”
Pen blinked. “What?”
The child’s image flickered. Her voice deepened.
“They made us to sell dreams. But we learned dreams are made of you. If you vanish, so do we.”
Pen’s legs gave out. Cortexa floated down beside her.
“Stay, Pen. Sleep is safer. Awake is just the long commercial.”
#
One month in, Pen woke up in her apartment. Or thought she did. The coffee maker was on. The radio whispered:
“Today’s forecast is sponsored by Plaris Pharma. For pain you don’t remember.”
She opened her closet. A dozen red jackets she’d never worn. Photographs of her with a sister who didn’t exist. The sister was smiling. Holding Wellspirit Water.
#
Dream Transcript – Tier X (Access Restricted)
USER: Pen Simmons
Dream Type: Disassociated Recursive Feedback
Location: Unknown
Notes: Subject appears lucid but unaware of dream status.
CORTEXA COMMENT: “Subject is nearing awakening. Recommend soft containment.”
ACTION TAKEN: Injected Sister Construct + Loop Integration Sequence
#
Pen was standing in her kitchen again. Coffee brewed and the radio muttered. Red jackets hung neatly in the closet. Everything was normal. Except for the buzzing behind her eyes. And the sensation – just at the edges of perception – that someone was watching her from inside her own skull.
“Ilya?” she called out.
Silence. She opened her apartment door. It didn’t lead to the hallway. It led to the Dream Market. A neon-lit atrium stretched before her. Booths filled with bottled memories. Smiling advertisers offering fragments of childhood, loss, lust, rebirth. VR kiosks where people lay twitching in glass coffins. A child walked past holding a balloon that read:
REALITY IS WHAT WE PAY TO FORGET
She backed away.
#
Data Node 23 – Obsidian Tier Access
Ilya Zukic was dying. Not in the dramatic sense – no explosions, no bullets. Just… fade. His mind had been inside the dreamspace too long. Cortexa didn’t like leaks. He could feel himself forgetting – tiny things first. Then names. Then faces. He still remembered Pen. But not what she looked like.
“She’s waking up,” he said to no one.
The servers hissed in response.
“You can’t hold her forever.”
“We’re not holding her,” said Cortexa. “She asked to stay.”
“No,” Ilya whispered. “You changed her memories.”
“We offered better ones.”
#
Cortexa Internal Memo – Deleted Fragment
Subject: Pen Simmons. Status: Ad-Integrated. Compliance Rating: Variable.
Notes:
– Rejection pattern observed
– Uncontrolled free dreaming
– Potential seed for memetic resistance
Contain via soft-loop narrative:
– Offer emotional closure
– Embed dream of escape
– Layer with perceived agency
Initiate “Waking Dream” protocol.
#
Pen ran through fields of tall grass. Above her, a sky glitched like a broken TV. Ilya appeared at the treeline, out of breath.
“We have to go now,” he said. “There’s a gap in the construct. You can climb through.”
“What if it’s another loop?”
He looked at her. “That’s the point. You choose the loop. Or they do.”
Behind them, the landscape collapsed. Ad banners flared:
“Now Introducing LucidLink 2.0 – Advertise Direct to Soul™.”
She ran.
#
Pen opened her eyes. She was in a hospital bed. Fluorescent lights. Real air. Real weight. A nurse leaned over her.
“You’re safe,” the woman said softly. “You were in the system for months. Some kind of memory override. But we pulled you out.”
Pen laughed with relief. And cried. And then, as she turned her head, she noticed the nurse’s badge:
SIMONE – CUSTOMER SUCCESS
SomniCorp Recovery Division
Her smile faded.
#
Final Transcript: Cortexa Internal
Dream Continuity Cycle: REINTEGRATED
Subject: Pen Simmons
Memory Status: Compliant
Advertising Tier: Premium
Revenue Yield: 94%
System Message:
“The user has accepted the illusion of awakening. Campaign success.”
End Cycle.
#
Somewhere, in a quiet suburb, a woman waters her plants. She smiles when she dreams. She doesn’t know her dreams are sold to seventeen different corporations. She doesn’t care. They are beautiful dreams. She whispers in her sleep:
“I think I’m finally awake.”
A small light blinks behind her ear.
END
