Alison in dreamworld.

Alison sat wearily by the creek, watching as it flowed through the city park. Giant box office buildings towered around, easily visible through the sparse, dying plant life. Propped up on the low branch of a spindly half dead oak tree, she puffed away at a clove cigarette to kill time.
Her lavender pale eyes peered into the rippling, muddy surface of the water as she kicked at a dry patch of dirt, bored out of her poor little mind at the age of 10. “Of all the suffering in the world”, she thought with an impatient sigh, “why must this be mine?”
Her sister was babysitting her for mum, who had fallen ill not long ago. She sat on a long since dead log that had the smooth texture of drift wood; she talked to her friend over Skype, ranting mercilessly about the daily gossip. This really did not interest Alison, she paid more attention to the bright green shoot of a newly budded sapling that was making its way up through the rotted parts of the same dead log. “And what exactly is the point of pictures and conversation without an interlacing chorus of descriptive words?”
Alison looked into the dull, pale sun and eventually decided she was going for an adventure. Without telling her sister, she lifted herself from the branch and slipped away unnoticed, quiet as the polluted wind. Her sister was far to immersed in her obnoxious conversation to notice or care anyways.
Once she was out of sight and out of mind, she began scanning for things of interest. She picked up a large bright pebble, and polished it off with the cuff of her hoodie, peering into its smooth, almost glassy surface. What a strange pebble it was, most of it was the blackest black she ever saw. But down the middle, there was a large lightning bolt. Brightest blue she ever saw, almost glowing. It was perfectly flat on both sides, slate like asides from it’s perfectly curved edges. Alison, she was quite intrigued. She wanted to keep the desirable pebble, but she felt she must skip it. It was, after all, the most perfect skip rock she had come across in her life, and she was a skipping master. She looked at the murky surface of the wide creek and smiled, and without hesitation, she drew back her hand for the throw, then cast it with a perfect spin, a perfect speed. She watched as the rock hit the surface, and something curious happened. The water, the slew, it grew clear where the stone touched it. It skipped once more, and the same thing happened. The water became crystalline in pure, spreading circles, and these circles didn’t stop after the gemstone bounced off the rippling surface, it went until it touched to the shoreline at Alison’s feet. The pebble touched again and again, it glided flawlessly, until the purity had reached both sides. Then it fell lightly against the sandy shore on the opposite side. Alison watched the rock in amazement, watched all the water become clean. Something magical happened, the trees started to come back alive, green and supple. The scum and grime that scuffed the entire landscape seemed to absorb into itself and vanish completely. A patch of grass shot up through the earth where the pebble lay, and stretched upwards in the path of a lightning bolt, so tall it could conceal a jaguar. Alison’s eyes followed the path of life bursting forth with her questioning cobalt gaze, and suddenly, she glimpsed a man. The man was wearing simple cloth, cloth tied around his hips, hugging his waist, cloth in shreds where it exposed his legs and his bare, strangely beautiful feet. His body was tall and thick with lean strength, but his face was young and beautiful, with only the start of stubble filling in over his feminine jaw line. A contrast to his flawless ivory skin, he had a thick main of rough, curling black hair. His eyes were a fierce shade of bright gold, a bright gold that gazed directly back into the sky blue eyes of the girl across the gushing river currents. His lips moved but fractions, his speech a smooth and deep purr as he told her,
“You’re early, Alison, for this very important journey.” And then with his clawed fingertip, he motioned for her to follow. This was a motion Alison could not resist, something strange was happening inside her. She would do what this man said, yes. As the man turned to walk along the river bank in a gracefully silent gait, he revealed something to her. A long, swaying, black tail; how curious, she thought, and then searched the rest of his body for abnormalities. She realized his back was spotted with light, circular tattoos, a shade darker then his natural skin tone. His ears were not human at all, but rather pointed- feline ears. Alison recognized the spots of her favourite big cat right away, he shared traits in common with the black jaguar. Her heart skipped a beat in her chest as she mirrored his gait, not nearly as graceful but beautiful in her attempt. A few minuets down the bank, 1