Chapter 1: Rocking the Stage in Yawners Inc., Floodum
Ah, good evening. I shall give all the Earthlings a small account of the goings-on of Floodum, my planet, just above this solar system in the halo region of space. Here, anything is possible - there is no such thing as dreaming for dreams and reality just mesh into one, meaning all live a blissful existence. And that includes myself.
I spent the first part of the day slightly unconscious, bobbing up and down in a rectangular tube with a window and helped by some (quite beautiful and glowing) man, who enshrouded my little tube with a rather comfortable blanket I clung to as if it were the end of the world. However, here's the thing with these dreamalitys: they always hold you close and give you a comforting hug, whispering sweet words into your ears and stroking your hair as if you were a little child.
I held tight to my dream-giver. His name is Ping, and he is a penguin who soaks up your fears and comforts you for your own sanity. Even in halo world, things can get a bit wracked up (like when an angel suddenly swoops down and craps on your eye), so it is brilliant to have someone to voluntarily show you the rudder and guide you on the right way through the Floodum Mechanical Life Maze.
I know, I know, little Earth People, I know I'm dropping words in this story that are probably too absurd for your little Earth-eyes to handle. So here is the story of the Floodum Mechanical Life Labyrinth.
The Floodum Mechanical Life Labyrinth is quite literally a maze they require you to navigate in halo land. The permanently head-scratching scientists who mull over their creation in peace brought a poet into their group, a decision which the scientists seriously defend though everyone else thinks was the most dalulu thing they ever did. This is because this was a nature poet, with a specific niche in the description and conjuring of mazes on the page. So you can guess that what he did, after his very first cup of coffee in their ethereal, red-walled headquarters with an elegant fireplace burning non-confrontationally in everyone's faces at all times, was suggest that the scientists creation of halo land immediately required a metaphorical "labyrinth of life". The scientists jumped on this idea since they'd never thought of anything quite so poetic before (they were too busy doing the blah-blah scientific foundations of the ideal utopia for wondering space nomads like myself).
However, the only thing this ridiculously metaphysical idea did for anyone is make their lives a living hell. For at the start, life was just a glue which you had to forge your way through. Though now, you had to navigate one of the billion paths to one of the billion finishes, though of course you get some who bash down and stamp on the restrictive hedges screaming until the end, where in most cases they will be drooped somewhere in the labyrinth quite near to the ACTUAL end, but rather isolated from anyone or anything else.
This is why we have the dream-givers; to stop us from bashing down these hedges. For if we do, we live a lonely existence; however, they do allow us to make some noise and cause a splash if we do not become lonely in the process. Those who trailblaze unrestrictedly were likely rather mean to their lovely dream-givers in childhood; this, my friend, is why they say "never meet your heroes".
The light of AngelLand came through just then, while I was mulling, as I always do, on the structure of the universe around me. It was the wake-up light for those who had to leave the slumpDream machine at some point in time (which I did for what you'd call school, but what I'd call force-feeding some that is good, and some that is garbage, into your brain). And yet, I do not believe I discussed the slumpDream machine! It is something your affable teddies slot you into every night. Now, this is why you have to be kind to them; otherwise they will not give you the good grace to slot you in the machine, and you can never access it again!
The slumpDream acts as a curious bridge, where we all spend half our lives. It is the bridge between reality and the novels you read, the TV you watch, the odd, bizarre imaginings you have. It is a world where anything can happen --- dreamality isn't bound by laws because who needs them? However, some of the life you lead outside of the bridge inevitably seeps in, though technologies are getting better now to block it; life then breathes its essence into the bridge, so it acts partially according to REALITY's hand.
So after I woke up from my dreamality, something rather strange for you but rather common-place for me, happened. I was transported through the washing machine that you humans would call school, but what I would call stuff that gets poured into your brain, some necessarily, some unnecessarily.
However, something rather funny happened today in Yawners incorporated (the name of my 'school', you see). where the model student seriously slipped in singing, "I LOVE ROCK & ROLL (come and spend some time in the gym box baby)". This was so atrocious at the time because he had a speech to make to all Little Yawners, but he just hogged the loudspeaker and sung at the loudest volume (with me secretly doing the piano) Joan Jett and the Blackhearts' most iconic song. It was hilarious, especially considering assembly is a place where they strap you to a chair and determinedly fill used cotton wool into your ears.
So, obviously the school could not possibly deal with such an atrocity. The cotton wool was strictly regulation stuff, and yet the model student had rebelliously snuffed it out of his sinuses, stamped on it, spat on it, and gave everyone punky honey. Next time, I shall probably sing something just as non-conformative; I am flirting with the idea of a Lady Gaga to get the teachers simultaneously dancing and, "Singing, YOU ARE NOW EXPELLED (COME AND SPEND SOME TIME IN HIS OFFICE, CHILD)". Mais pour maintenant, la prochaine et au revoir.