A dark road, a dark passage...

In this dream, I'm walking down a dark road late at night with four other people, two of whom are friends from my waking life. I'm not sure where we'd come from or where we were headed, but as I say it was very dark. So much so, that we could not see more than a few inches in front of us in either direction, almost as though a pale spotlight was on us.

I was in the front of the group, and at regular intervals, I would collapse as if one of my ankles had just given way. When that happened, I sat cross legged on the ground for a moment or so as one of my friends joked and told me to get up and stop slowing everyone else down. The same thing happened to another party member also.

The location suddenly changed without walking and the five of us were walking in a very dark passageway. As before, we could not see very far in front of us. I remember feeling creeped out at this point, as though there was something in this hallway that I didn't want to confront, but being with friends made it that little bit more bearable. Also, there was creepy music coming from somewhere in the dark. The music was a male, choral baritone; the lyrics were also pretty strange, but I've unfortunately forgotten them.

Anyway, as before I was ahead of the group and I looked into the distance and just about saw the figure of a young woman (late teens to early twenties) on crutches disappearing into the blackness of the passage. I then returned to my friends, who I found sitting on the ground behind me. All of a sudden, each of the four friends literally faded and vanished, leaving just me on my own. I then started to feel very scared, not wanting to face what was in this corridor alone, and it was at that point that I woke up, feeling slightly relieved.

To give a little background, the two friends were people I saw recently (i.e. over the weekend) one of whom had just returned having been away for 3 years. I can't think of anything specific that was happening in my life the day before, but I do have a lot on my plate at the moment; I have a hectic social life and work is very busy. I've also recently had new responsibilities at work due to a downsizing in our office and some of that work is a little daunting. I've also not been getting all that much sleep of late so between my busy social engagements, new work and lack of sleep, my mind has been in flux and sometimes, it feels like things are getting on top of me. Could this have something to do with it?