seeking_brilliance

@WaveInTheOcean aw a little harsh, did you listen to the whole thing? I like your track too, though sounds more like ambient music

@WaveInTheOcean

Have you played Link's awakening? ?

who knows... but... Fi!!

Awesome expressions, keep going ????

Are you the author of experiences?

@WaveInTheOcean do you ever feel you are tending an awesome garden?

I need to work on hypnotic and anchoring... Any tips? I can see hypnagogia.

Study your dream characters. What makes them act and give you advice?

While writing, I began to think about how to describe space, or actually what we call outer space. It became impossible to actually describe. Space is nothing: there's no air, no substance, no movement. Space is ever reaching as far as we know, and penetrates even down to the smallest known measurements. To that current evidence, we say there's nothing that isn't contained in space. Space is alpha. And yet, none of these are descriptions. Space simply is space. Reminds me of... ?‍♂️ So what's all that other stuff?? ? (oh and also it apparently smells like fumes or burnt charring meat... I knew we were in hell!! Jk)

remember when you discovered your little wee-wee?

@Red-White-Light well you simply didn't take a large enough dose, according to the interpretation of what Leo is saying. But why are you disappointed with your chakras opening? Again it sounds like your unmet expectations closed them up again. But also again, that's just my take on it.

Your reveal of what actually happened does not negate the experience. What did you expect to see on camera? It's all happening within. Sounds like they were opened and then your doubt and disappointment closed them up again but that's just my guess..

So if space of alpha, then matter, or anything imagined, is omega? And yet there is no separation between the two ? and Jesus claimed to be both ?? how hard it must have been to explain that to simpler minds 2000 years ago, until he started teaching them astral projection.

We can only tell you fan theories. They're fun to collect but only mean something if give them power, and still they only mean something to you; like passionately discussing your favourite series, book or movie with a peer who enjoys similar and different aspects of the same entertainment.

Density and consistency are beautiful liars. Ever been stuck in a false awakening loop?

If you were to become everything, it would mean you always were everything. Everything includes everything, so there's no opposite. So no, it's not possible.

ah ok, I tried to look for the audiobook version, but they just have Spiral Dynamics Integral, which seems to be a follow up book. I'll look for it on kindle. Thanks!

Where are we?

That's tulpamancy. I like to think a little further, for fun... Like, What if franz is a tulpa?

An 'odd reflection.' They are related to the 'nobodies'.

Stars of Clay Chapter One "Red or blue?" "What's that?" I asked, distracted. A colorful daydream of lying half naked on a warm, sunny beach was suddenly interrupted by the cold stare of a thin, mousy stewardess. She craned over my seat holding up two blankets in each hand, a raised eyebrow climbing higher and higher as I plucked the stereo-buds from my ears. "Red.…or blue?" she repeated slowly, giving the blankets a little jiggle in each hand. For the life of me, I couldn't make out what she wanted... " Which color would you prefer, sir?" She said with a stern impatience. It was hard not to chuckle as the raised brow now disappeared hilariously beneath the rim of her bright green uniform cap. She jiggled the blankets in each hand once more. "Oh," I replied, getting it at last. "Ah… blue, thanks." I took the blanket gratefully and threw it around my legs. I like either color, but they say blue helps you sleep calmer, and it was going to be a long ride. "Have a nice flight, sir," the stewardess said, through a strained smile. She walked away briskly, as if on a mission to dole out as many colored blankets as possible before passing the first hour of our three day flight. I leaned back in my chair, feeling the warmth of the thick blanket around my legs, returning the earbuds to their rightful home. The audiobook which I had downloaded the night before included several beginning meditations to choose from, and it had been quite a long time since my parents had let me go to the beach. They had deemed it uncouth, and demoralizing, and longed for the days when women were required to wear something to cover their breasts. That part never made sense to me, seeing as all beaches had been deemed "topless as you please" since well before my grandparent's time... After a quick countdown from ten, I was back at the warm, sunny, imaginary beach. An image of gentle waves crashing on a sandy shore flashed brightly in my mind's eye, and I swear I could almost hear a flock of seagulls calling melodically in the gentle breeze. "ATTENTION ALL PASSENGERS..." A deep and gravelly voice boomed from the intercom, as I begrudgingly removed the earbuds once more. "This is your pilot speaking. Please return your seats to the upright position and watch this brief orientation video." He then added, with an amusingly singsong cadence- "And from my seat to yours, we wish you a happy flight onboard the Star City Resort Transportation Line." I glanced over at my neighbor across the aisle. His cabin was exactly like mine- a three-walled cubicle consisting of a built-in bunk on the far end, a closet for storage and small side-table in the middle, and then our reclining seat on the outer portion, which lines the aisle forming a long row. By my count, there were ten cabins in the row- ours being somewhere in the middle- and there were three rows panning the shuttle. The seats were like any other airplane or shuttle seat, although admittedly a bit more spacious and comfortable. Directly in front of them, on the cubicle-like wall of the cabin, was a small circle printed in white, and the words "LOOK HERE FOR SCREEN". Moments later, a small plastic tube, which looked like a tiny black telescope, emerged from the wall. With a flash of light a holographic, optical screen materialized directly before my eyes, seemingly only several inches away. I looked over to my neighbor and luckily the screen did not follow… that would have been too claustrophobic, and I had always hated those models of optical screens. My neighbor chuckled loudly as he tried to stick his fingers through the invisible projection. Looking back at my own screen, I noticed it was playing an introductory video to Star City Resort, one I had seen many times before. It’s a wonder what one might find on the internet after winning a free all-expense ticket to the most famous and renowned resorts in the solar system. I had dreamed of visiting all my life, but it was never more than a child's fantasy. There was something about relaxing and being free, several planets away from my parents, that really appealed to me… I mean, don't get me wrong, they were good people. They raised me well. But being raised by dogmatic Moralists is not easy, especially if you don't buy into their whole "holier by example" theology. When I turned eighteen I moved out as soon as I was given permission by the state to drive a car. Packed and gone. The first year was pretty hard, sure, but then with a great stroke of luck I won these tickets and suddenly found myself being whisked away to the luxury vacation destination of my dreams. Funny thing was, I could only half remember filling out the sweepstakes kiosk at the mall. It was next to the one giving away a nice large speedboat with the lithium-assisted engines… honestly I could not tell you which kiosk was which… The orientation video had come to the point of explaining docking procedures onto the enormous space station that is Star City Resort. The space station itself comprises a large multi-leveled ring-- simply and aptly called "the ring"-- which encircles a central building, an architectural masterpiece shaped like a tetrahedron star, or "the hub". The hub spins on a long axis, connecting to the ring on opposite ends by long, rotating corridors. The shuttle is to land on one of the flat ledges of the star shaped hub, and us passengers are to remain seated and buckled-in until the artificial gravity is synchronized. After the video ended, I stood up, stretched my arms wide, and let out a big yawn that ended up being a bit more high-pitched than I had intended. I caught a quick peek at my neighbor across the aisle, who was obviously looking my way but then hastily turned away. I reached up and tugged the corner of the fabric curtain which hung from the ceiling in the rectangular opening of my cabin. I pulled it closed and attached the end to a small hook jutting out of the wall, effectively closing off my cabin for privacy. The earbuds returned home once again, and I swiped my tablet from the small side-table between my bunk and my seat, and threw myself across the plush bed, sinking deep into the silky quilted blanket. The bunk, or sleeping pod, was built into a circular depression. It recessed into the wall about five or six feet, just enough to spread out properly on all sides. On the far wall of the rounded cut-out, above the bed, was a porthole window. We had blasted through Earth's atmosphere pretty quick into takeoff, and the view of the stars outside was something that could take your breath away. I watched for several minutes before taking my tablet and pressing play on the audiobook. Imaginary beach, here I come… I awoke sometime after in a bit of a daze. My eyes were heavy and sleepy, and I could barely make out the laced valance hanging delicately from the top portion of the round sleeping pod. The cabin had been darkened to minimal recessed lighting, probably switched over to night mode at some point. I sat up, rubbing my eyes, and peered out the porthole window. It was hard to tell how fast we were going, as there was nothing to gauge it. Countless constellations of stars off in the unknown distances crawled slowly to the right, so we must have been moving along quite well. I wondered what had happened to my imaginary beach, as I couldn't quite recall much of the meditation at all, and had no clear indication of ever falling asleep. "The time is now! Find the silver-lining in every moment! Time to grab that anvil and hammer of life, and forge your own way!" The enthusiastic ring to the audiobook reader's voice gave cheerful commentary to the pantomime of constellations outside. In fact, I'm not sure if it was the grogginess or the cannabis wafers I had taken in preparation for such a long flight- but as he said the words "anvil and hammer", I could clear as day see them within the stars as constellations, kind of like seeing morphing faces in the clouds. I turned the volume down a bit, as his cheery derelict clashed with how groggy I was feeling. However, I liked what he was saying, and I had been wanting to read this book for months. Titled "Being Yourself: Forge Your Own Way," by Tony Hopskins, read by the author- it presented an idea that one must not get caught up in the traps of Moralism or Passivism, but that being yourself is key, using intuition to know when it is right to be moralistic, or passive. The author claims that this is not a new idea, but that he is "merely reintroducing it for a new generation." "History tells us," Tony Hopskins' effervescent voice turning a shade of troubled, "…that the Moralists and the Passivists rose in popularity as the two remaining sects of ordered conviction, emerging from the collapsing, bloodstained rubble of the old religions…" The window fogged from my breath, and I drew a little picture of Saturn in it with my finger. I admired Tony, perhaps because after escaping Moralism, he was the first to say things that made sense. A few days before leaving, I found out he was doing a live show at Star City, on my eight night there. I couldn't believe the luck… "…And indeed, the two couldn't be more different, sparking endless high-ground debates and borderline-civil protests. Yeesh! At least most of the old religions learned to leave each other alone!" I smiled as the constellation of a tutu wearing monkey, performing a pirouette, skated gracefully by. The author's point had hit home hard. My parents despised Passivists. "Immoral, intoxicated heathens, the lot of them!" was my dad's usual reply when asked his feelings on the Passivist movement. "Movement? They don't even do anything!" Notably, there are several grades of devout Moralism: you have the ones who appreciate morals, but really don't care too much for philosophizing about them; there's the ones who attend all the meetings, but couldn't really tell you the difference between humanism and transhumanism; and then you have my parents. Staunch, dogmatic, one-way-street Moralists who instill the fear of eternal unworthiness for letting even just one unmoral act slide. Although there was not much talk of an afterlife, so I could never understand who would inherit my eternal unworthiness if I were to, say, jump out of a moving airbus. When I was eleven, I told my mom and dad I was going to divorce them and go live with some nice Passivists who went to my school. Dad searched the Book of Moralism for three days before deeming it necessary to spank me raw. Mom begged him to stop and soon thereafter began researching Moralist oppositions to spanking children for punishment. Supposedly this was something that had died out a long time ago, but somehow made its way back into the Book of Moralism as a means of strict and swift redirection. Many aspects of Moralism rely on choosing the lesser of two evils. In this case, it was the urgent need to save a Moralist from corruption of Passivism which justified the swift and effective punishment. In fact, I never even talked to my Passivist schoolmates again, besides a simple hello every now and then. "… and the passivists are just as guilty of trading religion for a cult-like manifestation of conviction; as they are so completely and utterly passive about everything, almost --if not literally-- to a doctrine." My ability to see pictures within the stars began to fade, and I climbed out of the sleeping pod and onto the floor of the cabin. I stretched my legs with a bit of light yoga and looked curiously around the cabin. The author's voice faded away as thoughts began to percolate. The cabin was nice. Simple, but elegant. Not bad for a free ticket that I half-mindedly applied for. It wasn't first class, but it also wasn't a two-passenger cabin. See? Silver lining. Tony Hopskins would be proud. There was a quick double knock on the doorframe of my cabin, and I could see the silhouette of a stewardess standing prim and proper on the other side of the cream-colored fabric curtain. "Yes?" I answered, coming out of a strained, but cathartic, downward dog. "I'm here for your dinner order, Mr. Gardner," said the stewardess, as I pushed aside the thick curtain. The light of the aisle flooded my cabin and I had to squint a bit to see the stewardess. She was not the same one as before, but wearing the same bright green uniform and cap, and hair pulled tightly back into a bun. "We have a nice selection of meal wafers, sweet or savory." "Savory," I replied, feeling a bit peckish. "We have for you … " she paused, while using the stylus to bring up the appropriate menu on the tablet. "Baked mac and cheese, pumpkin pasta with spinach and mushrooms, broccoli and cheddar soup, or Thai coconut curry." I thought for a second before landing on "The pumpkin pasta, please." "Ok, thank you, Mr. Gardner. And what would you like to drink?" "Do you have alcohol?" "It's an extra charge, not included in your fare--" she began, then paused suddenly to look me over. "--Wait, how old are you?" She began furiously tapping on the tablet screen. "I've got your profile right here, sorry…" "I'm nineteen," I answered, helpfully. It wouldn't be my first drink, but definitely my first legal one, as the interplanetary travel drinking age was a very convenient nineteen years old. "Yes, so you are," she replied, and then tapped the screen a few more times. "And what would you like?" "Vodka and cranberry," I said, eyes widening with a newfound anticipation. "Heavy on the vodka." It took about five minutes for my meal to arrive via a pneumatic tube sandwiched between the closet and the sleeping pod, something which I had nearly missed had it not dinged softly upon delivery. The wafer came prepackaged in a brightly covered wrapper, with an enticing picture of steaming pumpkin pasta printed on the top. I had never really had pumpkin pasta, or any kind of pasta really, as cooking was nowadays a thing of the past, thanks to the many social restrictions and legislation the Moralists had rallied in favor of humanitarianism and reducing humanity's footprint. According to my aunt Nancie, who works a wafer farm in Milwaukee, this all came to a head after a certain species of plant developed the ability to scream shrilly when injured, and a soft cooing when caressed. This caused major uproar within the Moralist movement, and surprisingly within the Passivists as well, until it was mutually agreed upon that all plants and animals would be cared for as pets, not food. Some exceptions are made for the flowers and fruits, which were deemed as gifts and could be used in a few things like potpourris and alcoholic drinks. The wafers soon became the commonly accepted source of sustenance. They are made from certain algaes and seaweeds; which yes, are technically plants, but of course in the spirit of Moralism, the lesser of two evils won. Not to mention they carry a full spectrum of nutrition, and the wafers are optimized with daily caloric and fats intake, as it says so on every colorful wrapper. The drink arrived in a sealed tumbler, which I opened briskly and took a long sip. I sat in my seat and looked over towards the sleeping pod and into the starlit void beyond the porthole window. I tried imagining what it would look like when we arrived at Star City for docking. I had seen pictures and drawings of the massive floating resort, but I knew that nothing was going to compare to the real sight. A tinge of anxiousness and excitement swelled up in the pit of my stomach, making its way upward into my chest. I washed it down with few more sips of the vodka cranberry, and unwrapped my wafer. It was a brilliant orange color, with specks of green in between the hashmarks. I have no idea if it tasted like pumpkin, or pasta, but it wasn't bad. A bit peppery, perhaps. Not that I had much experience with pepper, but tried it once in a Bloody Mary and had tried to notice the flavor of it in any wafers I had since eaten. The time passed fairly quickly for the three day flight, much better than I had hoped for. I had quite a few long and drawn out fantasies of being so utterly bored and nearly dying of anticipation of getting there. The audiobook helped, but I found that I could only listen to it for brief periods of time, as my attention span only allowed for so much self reflection. However, the optical screen in front my seat had full access to the internet. After moving out and away from my parents, I discovered this site called "Youtube": a not too popular relic that survived the test of time. Typically only watched by Passivists, it was a treasure trove of entertainment, with content dating all the way back to the invention of cameras. Its mostly used in college, I've heard, in historical discussions. Personally I prefer the older entertainment to what's current, they just seemed to be much more creative back then, and funny. The flight was well into the second day when I tapped on a new favorite called "Friends Again" and watched as Rachel spitefully steals a piece of bacon from Ross's lips, as the other friends huddle around the nursing home's round cafeteria table, plotting their revenge on Stinky Pete. The pneumatic tube dinged and I stepped over to grab my lunch and tumbler of whisky sour. The mac and cheese wafer was a bit tastier than last night's course, and had a nice aromatic finish. I was always fascinated by "Mac and Cheese"- once I had asked my mom who Mac was, and why they synthesized a flavor after him, along with cheese of all things, but she never had a satisfying answer. Different brands of wafers presented the flavor a bit differently, and this one was probably the best I had ever tasted. Star City was known to manufacture some of the most coveted and delicious wafers in the solar system, to the point of being considered a delicacy. According to their orientation video, this was all due to proprietary composting methods for their algae farms; and if this wafer is any indication, this was going to be the best two week vacation of my life. Not that there was much to prove in that sense. The alcohol hit me quick and soon I felt the urge to urinate. With a quick tap on the optical screen, I paused the show right as Chandler began ranting about the cleanliness of the spoons. His face was distorted in a comical furrow, which was clearly saying "What the actual hell?" I pulled back the fabric curtain and stepped into the aisle. There were two restrooms, one on each end. With my cabin in the middle, I could easily make it to either, but noticed there was a small line forming at the one near the front of the shuttle. I turned left and made my way to the restroom in the back. Most cabins had their curtains pulled tightly closed, except for a few dotted here and there. One of them was a double bunk, and it didn't appear like the two strangers were wanting to be closed up together. On the way back from the toilet, I noticed the middle-aged lady covering her face in possible humiliation or intense headache; as the older heavyweight gentleman recounted a tale about how he and a few buddies went to Star City the previous year and golfed nude on the hundred acre range within the hub. He was clearly a Passivist: with the obvious signs such as his exaggerated body language; and the fact that with such strict dietary laws, the only ones overweight are those who were "gluttonous with the alcohol." By her mortified reaction, the lady was clearly a Moralist, but who could know? It's hard to tell sometimes, and it wasn't really any of my business anyway…. …It did bug me though, I'd be lying not to admit. Only because I knew how Moralists think and operate. I lived that life. I could understand clearly that they think they are doing what's right. I know they want to be good people. So perhaps I couldn't help myself, but I felt a bit mortified for the woman, seeing her like that. Poor lady just wanted to get away and test the waters of freedom. Trust me lady, the waters are just fine. I walked contemplatively back to my cabin, hoping not to run into that man and his nude golfing buddies during my two week stay. In fact, I decided to steer clear of the golfing range altogether. The next day and a half went by rather smoothly. Tony Baskins told me that happiness is not found in deeds or lack of deed, but that the pursuit of happiness is the very thing which causes a void of it to begin with. "….Its when you realize…" he said, bringing his tone down to that of a concerned teacher, "when you realize… you can't find happiness. It's true! Stop searching, its not there." I looked around my cabin incredulously, hanging upside down from the foot of my bed. What did he just say? I paid fourteen credits for this book, for him to tell me I'll never be happy? He's got some explaining to do when I meet him… "…HaHa! Are you still there?" His spirited voice pulled me out of remission. "Listen carefully… You. Can. Not. Find. Happiness. Stop looking, the pursuit only makes it elusive. Go and live an intuitive life. Forge your own way. And like magic, I promise, happiness will find YOU." "Pause," I said aloud to the tablet, and took out my earbuds. I hadn't hung off the edge of the bed since I was a kid. Back then, I could only do it during naptime, being the only time my parents typically left me well enough alone. They of course deemed it immoral to let a child dangle from any ledge, in any direction, although I never really understood why. But as I lay reverse-supine off the edge of the bed, my head nearly touching the floor of the darkened cabin, I caught site of something taped to the bottom of the pneumatic tube beside the sleeping pod. I slithered my way onto the floor and then stood up, reaching over to get a feel of it. It was a small, yellow piece of paper, with large, hand-scribbled letters-- --Don't go near Tony Hopskins. Stay away from his show. Meet me at Inner Sanctum. -- I stared blankly at the note, and turned it over a few times in my hand, unsure what to make of it. Was this a warning? A threat? A joke? How long had this been there, taped to the bottom of the tube? What was an inner sanctum? Surely this was some kind of Moralist prank to deter people from following a famed demoralizer. I threw the paper down into a small wastebasket below the pneumatic tube, and shook it out of mind. Well, if it was a Moralist, they weren't here now. They wouldn't be caught dead on a shuttle to "#Sin City". Well, except for that poor lady down the aisle. I wondered which horrific stories the older man was telling now… The end of the third day finally arrived, and I gathered all my belongings from the closet and packed them neatly in my suitcase. Typically I would not give so much attention to detail-- in direct spite of it being the moral thing to do-- but two weeks was a long time, and I only had one suitcase. Somehow my eye wandered over to the small wastebasket, and caught sight of the small yellow note. As much as I wanted, I was unable to ignore it. Before I knew what I was doing, I grabbed the note and threw it hastily in my suitcase before zipping up. The pilot made a quick announcement that we were coming up upon Saturn, as Star City orbits it high above its inner rings, on the northeast quadrant. "Those on starboard side will be able to get a clear panoramic view at this time," his deep, gravelly voice echoed throughout the shuttle. "I'll do a quick five minute spin so that passengers on port will have the same view. Please get your cameras ready now, I'll only do this once." I couldn't tear my eyes away from the window long enough to find my tablet. A picture would have never expressed the magnificence of this moment anyway. Saturn, with its golden rings of stone and ice encircling the giant gaseous planet-- resembled one of those artsy-crafts where you stick different colored sands between glass and shake it up a little. I had to catch my breath as I was so entranced by the sight, I forgot to breathe. Something occurred to me which gave me a new appreciation for these free tickets: the cabins along the inner aisles of the shuttle had no windows. I struggled a bit with whether or not I should go and grab my neighbor across the aisle, as my Moralist upbringing would feel indentured to do so simply because it would be the right thing to do. The newfound Passivist in me argued that I could do that, but risk missing the fullness of this experience if I were gone for too long--although If I wanted to do it, that would be alright also. Even Tony Hopskins chimed in and said I should forge my own way, intuitively, and not be enslaved to either sides of the argument. Ultimately, none of it mattered, as I could not tear my eyes away from the ethereal sight even if I tried. Eventually, Saturn crawled out of view as the pilot spun the shuttle around and I fell backwards on the bed, basking in the glow of the experience. Minutes later, he made another announcement that it was time to return to our seats and buckle in. We would make the final decent to Star City soon. I couldn't see the exterior of the space station quite as clearly while buckled into my seat, but it was nearly as impressive a view as the giant planet. A bit smaller than I imagined; but bewitching, monumental, and majestic. It orbited fairly close to the planet, and I could just see the massive rings of Saturn jutting up from the righthand corner of my window. The station was unlike any I had ever seen, even the one orbiting Mars which my family attended for a Moralism Convention several years ago. This station definitely earned its name-"Star City". The pyramidal star-shaped hub spun slowly between the massive ring, as if drawing the shuttle in to its mysterious and intoxicating depths. There was a bit of turbulence and the captain reappeared on the intercom to let us know that Saturn was giving off some strong waves from its surface and that there was absolutely nothing to worry about. The shuttle oriented itself around the front end of the station so that Saturn was now directly behind it, becoming an all-encapsulating and mesmerizing backdrop: swirling striations of yellow, brown and gray. As we docked, I realized just how massive the station truly was. The shuttle landed beside one of the large cone-shaped protrusions adorning the hub, which towered over us like a colossal metal pyramid. The pilot was having trouble aligning the landing tractions, so I got the full 360 panorama from my round window. The flat part of the hub stretched for a good half mile before the next--pyramid, for lack of better word-- protruded out with its sharp, skyscraping peak reaching up, and out into the cosmos. I couldn't even see the top of it from my window, when we finally touched safely down. I grabbed my suitcase and gave the cabin one last goodbye. It wasn't much, but it was much nicer than where I'd been living, and over the last three days it really sort of felt like home. Even Tony Hopskins said that a home is anywhere you feel safe, or loved. I felt very safe, and very loved with each delicious wafer and alcoholic beverage my thinning wallet could handle. Giving it a quick, silent salute, I bid my cozy little cabin farewell, so thankful that no one could see me. In the aisle, passengers had begun to form a line heading towards the front of the shuttle. I scuttled my way to the back, not realizing at first who I had come to stand behind. "…And I swear on my mother's unsoiled graved, Zilda, she came right up and told me …she had had all the rest, and wanted to try the best. I swear, I wouldn't lie…" "Uh-huh" I looked up to the sight of the red-faced, barrel mouthed older man and the poor lady who was unfortunately trapped with him for three days straight. Zilda did not seem too impressed, and as the line began to move, she decidedly stayed several steps behind. The large man continued boasting some unbelievable story about hot-rodding an illegal shuttle around the moon and back. When the line stopped moving, we were nearly parallel with my cabin. Zilda hung a bit back behind the man, and with another dry "uh-huh", accidentally caught my eye. "I'm sorry," I mouthed silently, with an encouraging smile. "What's that dear?" Zilda replied rather loudly, especially for a Moralist, but I could understand needing to hear herself over the boisterous man's loud and obnoxious dialogue. "I'm sorry," I repeated, out loud, with a slight chuckle. I nodded over to the man. "For what?" she replied, looking a bit perplexed. "Well, for… you know…" I waved my hand towards the man who was now expelling spittle from the sides of his mouth. I cringed as part of it landed on my cabin's curtain. "For what, honey? The long line?" she asked, looking up and down the line as if trying to figure out my meaning. I was a bit perplexed myself that it was so tough for her to catch what I was saying. It was difficult, being an ex-Moralist myself, since I knew that she would not be comfortable with me directly exposing her little secret. "Let's just say… I understand." I said, compassionately, holding my hand up to my chest. "It's a big resort, you probably won't have to see him again." The lady let out a surprisingly shrill and uproarious laugh, one that would give the old man a run for his money. "You mean Frank?" she replied, in between small gasping breaths. "Frank's my partner, dear, I won't be getting too far without him. Not until I lock him in the suite and escape away to find the virtual beach." She let out another shrill laugh and slapped her knee. "B- but… " I stuttered, completely stunned. "But… I thought… the other night…" "What's that dear?" "The other night, you…. You looked like he was giving you such a headache…" "He does! You saw that?" She burst out into another round of laughter, now grabbing the man's arm to keep her from falling over. "He does give me a headache! Its true… Have you met him? And he smells fairly awful, too." She patted him lovingly on the arm. "Oh sweetie, you're hilarious, what's your name?" "I- I- Cl-" was all I could sputter out, now completely mortified. The line began to move again and Zilda waved pleasantly as her and the older man were whisked away and off the shuttle. I followed at a distance behind, shocked and humiliated, until I came upon a bright green stewardess at the exit door. "Ticket?" She requested with a tender smile, swiping furiously on her handheld tablet. I reached into my shirt pocket and produced a rectangular, white printout; the words Star City Resort embossed in fancy gold letters. "Fingerprint here please," she said, holding the tablet up for me to access. I placed my finger in the appropriate spot, and the tablet dinged with a green glow. "Welcome to Star City Resort," she said, brightly. "Name?" "Clayton Gardner. You can call me Clay." "Welcome to Star City, Clay."

@Javfly33 haha it's all good, was just some spirited inquiry.

you don't discuss your dreams? I intricately discuss dreams with other dreamers. There's many forums and boards which discuss dreams because people enjoy that. Is this any different? Likewise, do you ever engage in fan theories about your favorite tv show, movie, or book?

@Peter124 are you lonely?