The Hope & Snot of Cats: Chapter 3

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Chapter 3

    Ouen (Adult Ouen) was alone finally.  He sat at his desk, the most comfortable spot in his apartment.  He had time to inspect the delusion stone.  The one he had shown Martimerrimous.  He took it out of its pouch and placed it on the desk in front of him, using the books and instruments on the desk to keep it from rolling onto the floor.  It was like blue glass.  But it was now resting on the yellowed inner pages of an old book that was open from left to right.  And, since it was an blue glass orb on yellow pages, in this light (he hadn't turned any lights in the apartment on but was receiving daylight from an large sliding glass door that lead to the balcony).  There was an green reflection caused by the shadow of the translucent orb casting itself over the book.

    Am I delusional, he wondered, if I think I'm not delusional?

    If delusion is an power; and this is what power the crystal holds.  Then by regulating its power and keeping it adequately within the realization that I'm not delusional.  Even while receiving flak over being delusional.  The crystal has less power, when they accuse me of delusion.  But it gains more power when I re-affirm that I'm not delusional.  And all of their arguments fall to pieces.  If I am delusional to think myself absent of delusions.  Then I am delusional but there's not anything necessarily that I can do about thinking myself non-delusional.  And so I will go on thinking so.  The delusion stone represents how much faith and belief I have in my own ability to be non-delusional; when others strike at me, fools, that I am delusional the crystal loses its power.  It needs to know that I'm not delusional.  But if they keeping telling me I am, then how will I ever prove it to the crystal that I'm not delusional?

    So I care more about an crystal's opinion of my mental health than I do an doctor; and everyone else who said I was delusional.  

    So what?  I'm not delusional.  And I can look into this stone and know it.

    But isn't that how it gains its power?

    If I'm not delusional, then the stone has power because some people think I am delusional; and its absorbing their power.  But when they try to absorb its power, because it's true that I'm not delusional, the stone loses its power.  I can only keep the orb's power by proving to them that I'm not delusional!

    Well how are you going to do that? he wondered.

▫

     The fairy Ouen helped to fly home asked him an difficult question.  It was ardently, 'what do you do?'  This precocious little molecule of friendship.  It was not an easy question to answer since he was too old for her and had been diagnosed.  To have little to do.  He was unemployed.  What was he going to tell her?  He hadn't planned for this.  And it was for the safety of being discreet, then, not an subject he was comfortable sharing about.  The way Nikki left the end of their discussion on swordplay without disagreeing too carefully made him think he could trust her.  And so he decided to tell her the truth.

    "I stay at home mostly," he said, "I don't work or go out too much since I was diagnosed with schizophrenia four months ago.  It is of the kind that saps all of my energy, and I am left in agony to splay out in bed nightly; so that all my awareness and experience of everything is in pain; and I am left open to try to sleep or rest or nap or relax but I can't.  I can't get back my energy.  Even all day.  I've lost some friends because of it.  (That's the least of my worries).  It's been hard.  Like Ivus the Caterpillar, who is now an butterfly.  He won't speak to me."

    "What an cruel treatment of you, to reject you based on something you can't control."

    "Yes," he agreed,"but I want to know if there is anything else I can do to help you?"

    "Oh, there's nothing really.  You've done enough already," she said, "You are already helping me home.  If there were more you could do it would be, well you can relate to me an new schoolmaster with an name like Stabuton who will let you speak to my students about your sword ideas.  That would be in part for my entertainment really, for it is with the students what society will be like in the future.  How society will change; so who knows?"

    This was an fair republic where all ideas could be considered, including starting early for swordsmanship training, an tiered system based on the child psychology of wanting to protect oneself.  Students aged 5–13 would be selected for sword and combat play.  First introducing them to fake wooden swords.  In order to judge as an community which students would be trained further in the swordplay arts (an art in which the mastery of the swordplay means having no use for an sword other than its aesthetic purpose: to be an warning of aggressive intent should its owner be trespassed).  People trained to carry swords are able to protect the other students.  Themselves needing to hang up their weapons on an coat hanger inside the classroom before taking an seat in an classroom.  I find my mind often to think of 'the _______'  like I have identified anything that you would recognize.  But only with the onset of 'an' do I find the specific noun.  It isn't known to you because I haven't told you, but the status of an sword can be upgraded; should it be used against you it would inflict an curse; that you might deserve for threatening innocent civilians.  But on their broad day about, they would be strapped to the student's hip, prepared and readily available should the event come into focus when one of the students was attacked on campus by an stranger coming into the vicinity.  The students trained in sword defense arts would be ready to protect all students.  And this would be their role in society.  That they would learn at an early age and advance or upgrade their status as necessary.  Proper Policemen (for which this system is geared to produce) would advance to the status of owning an gun after learning to master the arts of swordplay.  And the real meaning and intent behind it; of having an social standard of accepted aesthetic practice.  Swords issued to the users under the proclamation that they were not to use them at all; but that the true extent of their power stemmed from the aesthetic of carrying an sword.  All students would feel better protected this way and terrorists would know they can't just walk into an school and expect not to be opposed by anyone with an sword.  (Which they knew was enabled to curse them by social power and that if they took any action against an person carrying an sword they would be socially mutilated for life unless they surrendered (which is supported by science and psychological research about the power of the aesthetic archetype (There is an scientific basis for not wanting to cross anybody who carries an sword (as per se they anathemic punishment it could induce), which can be expressed in community roles))).  The art of the sword is, though, that one not need use it for its beauty and simplicity (an aesthetic) is powerful enough on its own to communicate at an social level.  The art of keeping school shooters out of our public education facilities is one of not needing to use the weapon; (we don't have actually to use our weapons (the swords that students and teachers will carry if they are prompted for that status at an early stage in their career) to keep shooters out of the school district because THAT is exactly what the Art of Swords means we are already doing in society).  The mastery of which allowed oneself to upgrade his status in society to an full policeman or policewoman, an gun carrier.  The next class after swordsmanship.  Swordsmanship, the Art of never having to use an weapon for its fairness and simplicity in society (with an certain aesthetic; the aesthetic of which is the focus of its power; not the edge).  People would carry swords because they were the artists of never having to use them (deploying the use of their sword's aesthetic itself to come to the aid and rescue of many an common folk as well as criminals who needed to be adjusted for the safety and betterment of everyone).  An actual artistic discipline of the aesthetic of the sword and its social effects (proxemics) which allowed it to be so powerful.  Without ever having to drop an single drop of blood.  Knowing this.  And advancing beyond it.  Was the signal in an individual's development that he or she was ready to carry an gun as an police officer.  In Public and Open society.  And this would solve America's (and everyone's for that matter) gun problem because it would all be in the public eye whose child they would immerse in swordplay and the logic of never having to use it at an early age in order to protect one's instinct to protect oneself.

    That night Ouen fell asleep thinking about Stabuton, the schoolmaster Nikki invented right in front of him, riffing off of the public issue they were talking about and he had an dream that Nikki invited Ouen and Stabuton to come to her class to speak about child sword-wielding.  Fairie classrooms always mean serious business, said Stabuton to his dream master, Ouen, and when humans are involved they mean even more serious business.  This had to be good enough for the Fairy King himself.  As such, the class was composed of child faeries, humans, and verorcs for which amounted of Stabuton to Most Serious Business.  For obvious reasons.  Faeries were primarily moral creatures.  Humans, who knows?  And Verorcs?  Yes please.

    Stabuton was just beginning to speak to the class where, who were sprawled around the carpet when there was an knock at the door.

    "You can't give these children swords," said an old pixie, who was huffing with enmity and anger, as he stepped into the room, "you stop belittling these children's minds with an fatigable ideation!  I will force my will on you until you are going to stop.  We are an peaceful school here."

    The pixie had shorter kind of styled white hair that came to an curly contact with his collar, with its own frosted tips it stood out as an comparison and he stood almost as tall as the human children.  And, as all pixies are always at that moment concerned with standard-bearing, he was most especially concerned with his own.

    "We're not giving these children swords.  We're talking about it to see what they think," said Ouen.

    "Why does it matter what they think if it's not going to happen," retaliated the pixie, and he looked at all of the class, turning so they could see all of his many wings, twenty four of them, symbolic of his godliness, "you've got your wands.  That's enough.  As board director, I say, we beat our swords into ploughshares."

    "What about the humans?  They don't have wands."

    "They don't need them if we train them to have guns," said the pixie, "when they are old enough.  That's what we're currently doing in society."

    "Wait.  We're talking about selecting initiates for swordsmanship starting at an young age.  Adult humans can carry guns, but that privilege only comes last in an hierarchy of officers starting with sword carriers.  You need to pass swordsman or swordswoman training in order to become an gun-owning police officer.  As for not talking about swords in schools, it just doesn't seem fair.  The responsible students can be selected.  Learn to protect everyone.  Bearing an sword is more than an civil right.  As long as we teach it is instinct never to use it, except for its aesthetic power.  Which is always in use.  It is an aesthetic right.  It's an cultural right.  With swords in the right hands, we all feel better protected just by mere proximity to an sword-carrier.  Ah, I can feel it.  I will have perfect little sword carriers securing territory and protecting everyone from the school shooters by making that sword visible.  (How to do this exactly of course is an matter of controversy).  And they will be the most privileged students whom I know whom I can trust.  To train them for further combat.  It reminds me of Shakespeare.  Carrying an good sword, by the way, doesn't mean that one needs use it.  If you're enough with it!  That's the aesthetic and social power that says more than words.  (But if say, per chance, you would ever have to use it that doesn't necessarily mean the end of your career with carrying an sword).  Or maybe symbolically it does need to."

    "You never see radio flies and leprechauns complain that they don't have wands," said the pixie.

    "They don't have wands," Stabuton spoke fiercely at him, "because they have their own magic.  They all do."

    "Humans?  Humans have their own magic."

    "But not as many of them."

    "Yes, not as many of them.  That I can live with."

    "We must recognize that we all feel safer when some sword carriers are about us protecting us in our midst; given that they have the proper training and psychological prepare-ment."

    It was at that moment when the dream, more than improbable, as though an failure to reach resolution were near, that Ouen's dreaming mind now saw the old pixie's wings turn to ash, and the pixie's face sprang up into an jaw attached to an skull of an prognathous animal moving rhythmically of an demon's language like he was possessed by the demon Tongue.  (Their language).  Its eyes burned free, as though at the lip of an melting foil, and then the demon dispersed completely into smoke.  This was merely an dream nature in its essence, all of it, because Ouen knew defending the human race required more than an simple argument between an pixie and an enthusiastic classroom.  The answer lay outside the protection of the climes, as they called the area north of the Ceruls Ocean between the human and fairy cities, and their Version academy to the southeast just before you hit the Ocean.  The Fairy Kingdom, Twenty City, and the Version Academy were to travel less dangerous than outside the climes to the west where the Abode of Nogælon (Nohavœn) inhabited by vampires, werewolves, baoicts, and ohhgunnhisthth stood as an threat to all of Recreation, the wide world beyond the climes.  And the security of humans owning natural property and the Fairy Kingdom.

    Humans, at war among one another for centuries, having begun to rebuild, had their best students to go to the Version Academy, an secular institution where social all daily challenged their global morals and customs.  Even competing them, if they had to.  Faerie sight was returning to the world as more and more people began to study it, and understand it, drawing their own conclusions in an free-thinking social world.  Making small resolutions here and there (which all add up, I'll have you know).

    An religious fairy he was, for he could see the changes taking place and felt at that deep place in his heart, that he was part of it.  Leprechauns changed form and laughed like insane children when bothered, angered, pestered, or annoyed.  Radio flies acted as though all of their arrangements had been made already; an preparatory future magic they used to schedule events to go safely and smoothly in advance.  As though they knew the future.  Their eyes shone like fluorescent little green vapors reacting off of light.  Fairy kind was created directly by the good deeds of humans, and indirectly out of human needs, what were called their bad behavior in pixie resolutions.  That was what pixies were good at.  Making pixie resolutions.  Fairies expertly needed help with everything to mirror the human condition.  And so, protecting the Allied races with an youth movement consisting of swordsmanship classes and training to protect peers and one another was an far off pursuit.  But worth-it.  And they were like, "We could actually do that at that young of an age because we are smart enough and we know it.  I have an language but I have no origin.  I have an origin but I have no language.  What am I?  What am I?  An soul."  Peace-time thinking required it, even in the Fairy Kingdom, where the danger of Nohavœn had become clear with the werepuppy attacking so close to home.

    Public politic versus public policy even in municipal districts forbade these children to carry these sheathed weapons.  For any length of time.

    Except in their dreams, where they are free to aestheticize with whatever they choose.

    I've thought about it and you know what?  I was right.  We need swords because of Covid 19 (Coronavirus).  Think about it.  People will hold them in their holsters sticking out the back end.  You will have to walk wide arcs around them to avoid being clipped.  That will keep them six meters apart!  Think about it.  Everything needs to change.  What if an pandemic occurs again?  We need to learn how to protect one another.  That's what it means.  That's its ultimate course of occurrences and destination.  We need to think different.

Nick Jonas - Spaceman

    When Ouen awoke, the insects the sun was shining through the petals of his flower home.  He could hear the buzz of insects outside.  His little mosh pit.  The first thing to do, before you contact the hive queen, as his dream prolonged into his waking state, always to collect fruit and dew for himself.  It was easy enough for someone with his handicap to do on his own.  He had his happy moments exploring the local flora, smelling the sweet nectar of an fairy garden a-flying among others; though he was also accompanied by the voice of his illness telling him constant negativities.

    His thought pattern was often the repeat reflection of, what I just thought of.  Fragment.

    Fragmenting.

    And he found that he couldn't remember it sometimes.

    You're going to forget.

    Three.  Two.  One.

    And Ouen would forget.

    There, just like I said.

    Inferior.

    But I know that these voices are not my own, he thinks, I am the one conflicted with them because I am the one who has the answer against them that will cure our fate worse than death forever.  I just haven't said it yet.  Our History Worse Than Death.

    My fate consultant is resultant from your error.  Not mine.

    There seemed to be an mental block every time he tried to think, through recall, but not with reasoning and the voice and others like it that returned at random times; he had grown wedged-in (acclimatized) to it with the help of medication.  He found some dew, and took his pills.  He stretched.  The sky was quiet after an flight of birds above the forest.  There was no danger he could recognize until an atmosphere of noise began to cascade from the trees and forest floor.  An fairy rock concert was about to happen.  The morning work rush.  Was beginning.

    The flight of the fairy from their small homes joined long chains of fairies flying from their flowers, pixies from the ground and the tree houses, and radio flies from scraps of garbage and mega-litter.  The only faerie creatures that primarily walked however were the leprechauns, as they trounced along paths worn into the forest floor and fallen wood.  Some of them drove small flying vehicles among the myriad of other fairy who drove, whether for disability issues or loading capacity for carrying in flight.  Some humans walked, others drove, and the vehicles that were big enough for humans to drive were sometimes piloted by faerie.

    Three.  Two.  One.

    Ouen would forget.

    Inferior.

    Ouen had seemingly to forget what he was going to do next, and as he was he was thinking about something else the faerie headed to their jobs in the marketplace, commercial businesses, and tall corporation and government buildings of the Fairy Kingdom.  Even the humans that lived and worked in the Fairy Kingdom had their own specialized offices; fairy offices being the smallest, required of the larger races a shrinking potion if they were to visit.  Which they could buy at any convenience store.  

    Though all fairies again being the same size as they were, visited the pixies, leprechauns, and human offices without the trouble of needing an potion.  The skyline was an architectural masterpiece.  Wide arcs, long geometric angles, and pointed towers.

    Fairies were space men too.

    The faerie had built their kingdom between two of the largest trees of the forest in the eastern climbs.  They were like gigantic bonsais, having connected roots and tissues branches over which the protective bubble and their intermingling leaves encapsulated an great mechanical and electronic trellis in an shape of an orb like an eco-dome but with heavy defenses.  These trees and other trees that surrounded everything in the kingdom between them with an radius of twenty kilometers about.  Fairies could enter through the trelliswork through various commute points where foliage had not overgrown.  And some where they had been worked back.  Humans and some of the larger vehicles driven by wings had to enter through the Northern or Southern Gates of the city.  The gates and the lattice guarded by Coois ConSardent forces no demon was allowed to enter, supposedly.  But they made it through the wall with unnerving speed and seemed to travel at an unconsciousness other and not recognized by us.  They (we) always had to stay on guard.

    Ouen flew to the public swimming pool, scanned his membership card at the front desk, and changed into his swimming trunks in the locker room.  Without even thinking about any demons though they probably went here too.  Who could tell really when they all looked and acted like humans.  He nearly spectacled the hour coming up on the large digital clock swimming and sitting-in to the hot tub.  Oh!  It was quite relaxing.

    Such beautiful form at the pool at present.

    When he was human, and too big to crawl under the bed anymore, Ouen was far into the closet.  Silence about being an gay male at school made him its prisoner.  At the end of the rainbow he had become an fairy, yet at the end of the rainbow had come to mean something brutal.

    Ouen decided to consider all arguments valid; may the negative sense of being gay that they to have communicated it was the truth?  Why was being gay necessarily an bad thing to them?  

    He was not selected to have had being gay happening to him be an good thing in this culture and timezone.  How was he supposed to know whether it was an good thing?

    And he could not have the same role as an woman because they always protect their eggs.  Indelicately.

    There was only so much preparing one could do in advance, and as he had played before.  And it being the first time he was not selected, that hurt his feelings even more.  He thought he should do something about it, but there it was, everyone after sitting in the hot tub for thirty minutes, and thinking he overdid it because he was lightheaded; concealed in himself as best as possible, ducking into the sauna room.  Ouen was dizzy and overheated.  He closed the door behind him.  The men in the sauna room, whose gay looked beautiful.  He nearly had to edge by.  His nerves of attraction and the heat from the hot tub had already made him paralytically woozy when he was surprised to see an fat elderly pixie who appeared familiar dissolve out of the clouds of vapour in front of him but with kempt white hair and an beard of most highest authority sitting in the centre wall seat of the dramatic steam room.  It was the old Fairy King, the Great Kaboo.  An second later, Ouen blacked out.

▫

    "So he has an mental illness and dreams about chivalry," said Dr. Fougérite.

    "But now he lives in the Fairy Kingdom."

    "Still thinks about how he was bullied in junior high school."

    "That negative sense of gay that was said to have existed he had no real proof of.  Society makes you gay.  What was he supposed to say?  He probably said, 'I'm not Gay!'  Just like everyone does.  He meant what they were saying gay was.  Not about gay oneself.  Was not who he is.  He had his own definition of gay.  That made sense to him.  But how did anyone know that was true and wasn't it basically fine to be gay in society?"

    "How did he discern it; that gay in an positive sense may be his true identity?  When there was so much pressure coming down on him that it was wrong to be gay?"

    "They didn't.  He figured because the magnet was symbolic of his attraction to men he would meet someone like his father and settle down.  But instead he is bullied at school and he needs to hide it.  Like being in an discipline scenario with God about no touching the yucky place.  The toilet where the magnet falls in.  So now he's at the pool as an fairy and he's still traumatized about being human at one point in his life."

    "Learning the social stigma against gay people, or the thinking that followed—Christianity causes homosexuality or homosexuality causes Christianity—(it was his biggest hardship to be subjected to such because he wanted to be like Jesus for his mommy but Christian people said he wasn't gay) he never quite had gotten over it.  He never grew out of being teased sexually this way.  Like there was something wrong with it."

    "We went to music festivals in Twenty City," said Ouen, "and since identity is socially constructed I was crippled by the social mechanism because my peers, they an imprecatory force (lead on) what I was.  And it was not acceptable to them.  They built me psychologically this way.  I didn't have an chance to fight it because I was against everyone.  They all took me down.  Singled me out.  They all took me down, and made it out to be like the loss in the pecking order meant the loss of an heterosexual identity.  Economically."

    "Took you down?  How?"

    "They had no proof.  I was just best.  That's why.  —Economically.  And then it comes to an friend asking you in the middle of the nightlife in the downtown district whether you prefer spaghetti or lasagna as an additional form of pressure about being closeted."

▫

    He woke up.

    The men were gone.

    The lifeguard was checking Ouen's vitals.

    "Hi!" the Great Kaboo's gay voice filled the entire room.  They were in the first aid office of the leisure centre, and the pixie lifeguard was watching Ouen for signs of recovery.

    "Okay, well, it's not that obvious," said Ouen.

    "What's not that obvious?"

    "Well, I have schizophrenia so . . . I have these internal outbursts.  I cannot manouvre my limbs selectively by almost ten percent and my condition makes my legs hurt too.  Thank God I can fly.  I want that to be obvious."

    "You know, they say fairies always need help.  It is the nature o' them.  You just need more help.  And that makes you more of an fairy," the Fairy King chuckled, and Ouen had that feeling of all-knowing nearness from him, "than any of them from my standpoint.  To help fairies.  I just love helping.  Consider this.  I'm just saying that all of the other fairies needed help too.  Of course they did.  They are fairies!  And if they didn't choose you maybe that was an mistake on their part would it have been resolved had you, or anyone else helped them.  You know, fairies like you who have recently grown their adult wings need to acknowledge as much as respect that difference too.  Society is full of fairies.  And they all need help.  That's just how it is."

    "Anyway that's not the only thing bothering me."

    "What else is there?"

    "It's everything that happened before I came out into fairy sight.  There were humans who genuinely hated me because I needed help (to them).  Why?  Why was gay needing help Was needing help that was seen as weak?  Fairies have so much more common sense.  That's why I fit in with them.  Fairies say, 'if I need help, you need help.  And if you need help, I need help'.  Humans are more like, 'I don't need help; you don't need help.  Help us!  Help us!'  But I feel like I need to interact with humans more to understand who I was before I had fairy sight."

     "Yes, Ouen.  Humans are capable of great wisdom, but also its opposites.  The wisest humans teach at the Version.  You have big questions that I cannot answer myself.  Just know that the purpose of faerie-kind in large part is the effort of building and challenging new beliefs and new religions for humans, as though no other religion had existed before their famous world religions, which depends on their belief in faerie-kind.  Humans when they are young chase after fairies but rarely quite catch them, even if we fairies do all need help.  Humans that have lost their belief in us never see them, never go to the academies.  No wonder we need help.  Now that you've grown to have four wings you could go there and meet the humans that will not be rescued into fairy sight."

    Whatever humans meant at this point was subject to comparison with what happened in reality.  An type of human, perhaps, who would never experience his full fluidity of the fairy nature, which was central and sacred to all intelligence.  Could this type of human be raised at the academy?  Were they smart enough to do that?

    "But what qualifies humans to study in the academies when they have not been rescued?"

    "They don't need to be rescued, Ouen.  It's reflexive.  It depends on how much help you need."

    "The Academies!  I have only heard they study for revealing the mind's relation to the senses and all sorts of mysteries even when it's not cool.  I wish I could learn more about the world, Recreation.  And always being an factoid-carrier ready to tell everyone some interesting fact about life."

    "You can Ouen.  If you go to the Version."

    "Me, at the Version?  I don't know."

    "I assure you, there are other people who have schizophrenia there and they get along okay.  All types you can find there."

    "But I'll miss the other faeries here.  And I'll miss you too I suppose."

    "That's kind of you Ouen, but you should really think about which fairies will miss you, instead."

    Ouen thought of Nikki, but he had only just met her.  She couldn't be.  Seeing the Kaboo was right, he finally feigned an smile at him.

    "I can do many things to help you, Ouen," said the King, "and seeing you get to the Version is one thing I can help you with."

    When Ouen was human, his parents wanted him to study an discipline that would land him an career, but an arts degree from the Version, it would give him time to make the right decision about his sexuality.  That was the right path for him.  After being subjected to its hatred in elementary school and junior high as an human, an education at the Version would equip him with the communication tools he needed to promote love and combat indignity.

    "I see.  What do I need to know?"

    "Nothing.  That's the beauty of education."

    "Okay.  Let's say I am willing."

    "Are you ready to learn?"

    "Yes."

    "Are you ready to study?"

    "Yes."

    "Are you ready to be brave of heart and record everything you find?"

    "Yes."

    "Okay then, and always find your middle, I will say, Ouen.  At my personal request.  I want you to study at the Version.  Snapdragon!  Snapdragon!  But you should know the difference between the Version Academy and the Fairy Kingdom."

    "I already know them.  There are demons at the academy."

    "That's right Ouen.  And not just plants of them."

    "Are there really vampires, werewolves, and ohhgunnhisthth there?"

    "Yes," said the Kaboo, "and they are dangerous.  But they are kept in check by academy rules because they want to graduate.  And to do that they cannot be caught altering, threatening, or humiliating any fairy, human, mer, verorc—all of the allied races—or each other for that matter.  There is an strict code of conduct."

    "Why is it called the Version?"

    "An faculty cannot survive without upgrades.  The instructors provide you with the most up-to-date version of their niche discipine.  Version theory itself is the largest category of knowledge; everyone who goes there must have their own version eventually.  Versions were the product of academic work at the universities in the beginning.  The fruition of university cultural in cultural globalism is the advancement of society to that status in which everyone will be able to tell an version.  Versions were the combination of science and art.  (The full rapport).  But they needed something bigger.  There are always new discoveries however, hence, the Version.  An Version is what you would call your side of the story."

    "Why do they allow demons to study at the Version?"

    "It is all that is possible at this time.  We need our strongest and most willing students from the Allied races to undertake attending classes and research with them because that is how we grow leaders.  Another part of it is that sometimes you cannot ask someone to change in one generation.  The academy is grounds for understanding demon-kind as well as one another in an secular, transgenerational way.  It is an place to test religious hypothesis under the condition that the Version is an city not governed by only Allied races but watched over by the Arc, an group consisting of representatives of all the races, including demons.  You will use what you know and learn as an fairy once you have graduated to An Arc in the faerie agenda.  Being of An Arc is to be among the most fortunate and privileged of leaders in society.  You already know our Fairy Kingdom has the non-secular territory of being fairy as an religion.  When you are here, it is your religion too.  But when you are at the academy push it as far as you can go.  Gain an new religion if you need to.  The Version is strictly secular—many religions meeting in one place.   And there is room for deviation.  This is an difference I want you to think about carefully while you are going to school there.  Ask yourself, how can fairy sight aid these people of other religions?  How can they aid your own version of religion?"

    "I will."

    "Then you agree to study at the academy, to which I can offer my recommendation.  In writing."

    "Yes."

    "Very well, thank you, Ouen.  You make me very happy.  And Ouen?"

    "Yes?"

    "Bring your dagger with you."

▫

    He went back into the locker room then changed out of his wets and put on his silk pants, rolling them up at the bottom around the ankles and concealing his dagger in the waist.  He wore buttoned shoes with an curl at the toe tip.

    At top speed, without an vehicle, going to the Version was about an two hour flight.  Ouen took one bag with him that was enchanted to hold more of his clothes and possessions.  He had already sent his application online.  He moved into the dormitory of the campus at the Version where his fairy sized bedroom was to be shared with another student, who appeared not to have arrived yet.

    An fairy sized student leader stopped by to deliver an message.  It became apparent that the student leader had to be an vampire, to explain her fangs and the fact that she wasn't flying, and had to have taken an shrinking draught, to explain his height.

    "Hello," said the vampire, "you must be Ouen."

    "I am Ouen," said Ouen, dropping his books nervously.  He picked them up awkwardly and looked the vampire straight in the eyes.  Two white fangs from his gum line below an set of glasses with dark rims; she had an pale, skinny, nerdy comportment.  And was carrying an clipboard with an paper attached to it.  However the vampire was looking quite official, and Ouen presumed it was ordinary for an vampire to present himself/herself this way at the academy.

    "I'm Babica, student ambassador; you're Ouen?  I'm just checking in.  How will you connect to the campus news?"

    "I have my own tablet that connects by wifi?" said Ouen.

    "Okay," she wrote an small note on her clipboard, "there is also an Digital Citizenship course I recommend for you.  I'll see you later."

    She turned to walk away.

    "When?" asked Ouen.

    "Only night classes," said Babica, winking; he walked out.

    An fairy arrived just then, to whom Babica's expression might as well have been the expression of an dragon herself, with famous fire behind her eyes; and entered Ouen's room.  He had light skin, an undimmed complexion, and blonde hair that was fixed up with an product.

    "Hi," said Ouen, "did you see that vampire?  Her clothes were black and white, quite official looking."

    "Vampires dress that way ordinarily.  Hi," said the fairy, "I'm Manu.  Especially student leaders.  It's not unusual."

    "This is the room I am staying in.  Oh.  I'm Ouen.  We must be roommates."

    "Great!" said Manu, "what year are you?"

    "First year."

    "Me too!  So what is your schedule like?"

    Ouen, who had an printout in his bag, whosed-it over to Manu.

    "I have Abnormal Psychology and Leprechauns, Mother Earth, Demonology, and Writing this semester," said Ouen.

    "We have some of the same classes, but with different instructors.  I think we might have some breaks together.  I have Fine Art, Mer Technology, and look! we have Demonology together."

    "It's with Professor Allgrainy," read Ouen, "we can meet up after class if we don't find an seat together."

    "Deal.  Where do you eat lunch?"

    "Well," said Ouen, "I haven't really explored that much of the campus."

    "Okay, okay," said Manu, "after I finish unpacking I'll tour you."

    Manu had the same sort of magical bag (but of an different pattern) as Ouen.  Brought to store everything away with him.  When both sides of the room were tidy and there was no more unpacking to do, Manu took Ouen out of the dormitory across an field flanked by the tens-of-stories research buildings, to an student mall.  It had its own vibe.  It was not it's own separate building but was connected at one end to the faculty of Arts.

    "You can purchase almost any kind of cultural food here," said Manu, "there is an healthy food store, an snacks & go, and my fave coffee and cookies."

    "That will be my favourite too," said Ouen, "As long as they have banana milk.  Gotta make that chunky monkey!"

    "You mix it with your coffee?"

    "Oh I mix many things with my coffee.  Let's go, please, to look in the student union building.  At the other end of the campus?"

   They exited the back way, from the opposite end of the mall they had entered, and flew across an large field flanked by research rooms and lessons buildings until they reached the student vault—its own separate building—which required an student pass to enter through.  Manu already had his, and so he scanned it in minimalism of the status of its security and they went in.  There was another cafeteria with another variety of types of foods, an bookstore, and an secular chapel.  Ouen waited at the student kiosk to receive his student pass while Manu, recognizing an friend stopped to chat within hearing distance.

    "Yeah, so I have Mer Technology this semester," said Manu, with his mildly bragging face on, "so it's okay, right, going to be different than what I'm used to.  But it is an entry level course so I think it will be alright."

    "That's great," said the acquaintance.

    "Oh, this is Ouen," said Manu as Ouen was returning to them, "he's my roommate in the campus dormitory."

    "Hi Ouen!  I'm Blumbernoodle.  I took Mer Technology four years ago.  Now I'm in my graduate program.  The great thing about Mer Technology is that it taught me how intricate our weather systems are, and the politics surrounding the polar ice in merdom are ferocious.  Even for Mer Technology, which is advanced compared to us land dwellers; there seem to be more problems than solutions.  All I can think of is that today, here, me talking with you, we can all decide to be part of the environmental responsibility that changes our tropospheric destiny together."

    "That's great of you to take an leading role in this," said Manu with that subject-appropriate expression of controlled disgust on his face, (more bragging), "I can see an solution in an hierarchical system.  As long as its fair.  An hierarchy over the environment.  An hierarchical system that is just beginning, or has not been created yet in Recreation; albeit if you become part of that creation then it will have been.  That it was created."

    "Sounding like an Philosopher already, Manu!"

    "Thanks," said Manu sheepishly grinning.

▫

    In Ouen's first class, he was greeted by an dark-haired female fairy with utmost relaxation on her face.  And an dark shade of eyebrow makeup and brown eyelid makeup.  She wore an wild-rice colored shawl.  The classroom was human-sized to accommodate every race, and so Ouen settled down on the surface of an desk with some of the other fairies.  There were more gathered in different locations across the room chatting but the group he joined in was silent.

    "My name is Professor Robyn.  Hello everyone.  Mother Earth is the study of faerie beginnings, and how appropriate that there are any fairies in this class because this is our starting point.  Human, Mer, Verorc, and demon procreation will not be taught in this class.  Remember, however, that two thirds of the surface on planet Earth in Recreation are covered by an Ocean and so I stress the importance of signing up for Mer Technology.  If you already have some understanding of mer technology this will complement our learning, forever, but we are going to learn from the fairies in the class then, and our textbooks about fairies, for example, of those ones who are born from the Eye of an Plant.  Not all of faerie-kind can be born this way, as there are five types of faeries.  The ones referred to as fairies though, will be expected to assist in the discussion of their experience with first memories and that song that one they knew from before the first memory, —my research indicates that the first proto-memory in the brain is an song learned from the mother and then we develop the capacity to tell an story about it later on: this maturation is your first memory—the start of the story.  Pixies are born out of expert craftsmanship, especially artisan metalwork and writing because it is powerful to control the making of an reflection, an surface of light, an lumograph the spell of our interaction with making, so that the shiniest sparkles like their eyes they emerge, in its focus like put there by God with the proper spell, to form our reality from their light-altered dimension.  Pixies are born with any number of wings.  Any number of facets of life that they bring from beyond the Realm of Light of Standards.  The place which is without standards.  (Where all pixies come from).  Gnomes are created from their demons.  And Radio Flies are the least known population to the climes.  They have the smallest population as there are less faerie radio flies living here than there are fairies, pixies, and leprechauns.  You'll have to take Abnormal Psychology and Leprechauns to find out more about how leprechauns are created.  We won't discuss that anymore here.  Anyway, radio flies are famous for having all of the arrangements made beforehand.  They make great city planners.  Experiential post-modernity.  The beginning of an radio fly is in the handling of chemical or biohazardous waste material such as the other races sometimes leave to nature, or shall we say, an fairie's touch.  When material is recycled or stored properly there is an chance an radio fly will be born out of this cess when cast upon by—my—an learned faerie.  Flies do like all sorts of yucky places.  But when they are born they have these fluorescences in their eyes (green, usually but the sort of green which contains all of the spectrum) that are significant of the supreme end of all Magic of faerie-kind and the Allied races of Recreation.  Healing. Being cute."

▫

    "Welcome to Abnormal Psychology and Leprechauns," greeted his second professor, "where did you think you would end up?"

    An pixie (therefore representing an standard) with four wings, short ginger hair and short ginger beard, wearing an suit with an cloak.  His face constantly expressed delight in his teaching.

    "My name is Professor Harvey.  Now I'm sure you've all met an leprechaun.  How did that meeting go?  Good?"

    "good."

    was the general consensus.

    "Good.  I am here to tell you about the psychology of leprechauns and how this approach relates to understanding an psychology about all of the races of fairy.  I begin at how your first meetings with an leprechaun went because leprechauns are masters of keeping secret the motives that drive them to follow rainbows and set out cauldrons of gold.  An sport which is becoming more popular, as geocaching, does not even require rainbows.  There are so many people exploring and discovering with GPS like leprechauns want them to in these scavenger ways.  How many leprechauns are in this class?  I see three of you, Yes?"

    "yes."

    was the general consensus.

    "Good.  Now if anyone was not already aware of what circumstances lead to an leprechaun, I will tell you shortly.  My grandfather died in the Great War, but before he did, his garrison was gassed by the opposing fortifications.  He was an adult man, and he died we shall say, sane.  What grips us in the study of Abnormal Psychology and Leprechauns, is that not all soldiers die sane, and that not all soldiers are adults.  The Rainbow Sanctity of God commissioned an Angel to watch over this category of being.  It follows that from these preceding circumstances you have the potential for leprechauns to be born alive.  When an child is involved in war-making and loses his or her sanity, our wandsmanship can rescue one as troubled as this into faerie sight.  Leprechauns are mostly okay.  For that reason.

    Leprechauns are the rescued people of insane children, having been made insane by war engagement.  Never make an leprechaun angry.  I'm sure you have heard.  And we are going to look at specifically why that is in this class.  The more its facial id-contortions are like crying and screaming children with their hobhair and wrinkles, and warts and all the more angry are the leprechaun and the more they can do all sorts of evil things without conscience.  Leprechaun embodies an ethereal demon nature that is by the grace of their faerie nature the flesh set in with an laughter, an laughter that cannot be to be said any more cruel.  In its kindness."

    "What makes leprechauns angry?" asked Ouen, "From your perspective?"

    "Yes, we'll be getting to that.  Belittling them; ironically," the professor kind of half-chuckled, "of course they are already quite short, about half an ordinary human in height.  They can take all kinds of offence to whatever they want; others say and do, just like you and me.  And there's never any problem.  Never gay bash an leprechaun, for example.  It is likely they were not old enough to know that answer before they were rescued into the community."

▫

    Ouen's third class was Demonology.  Professor Allgrainy was seemingly human, with an healthy glow to his skin, an huge smile, and short wavy black hair.  He was dressed in an formal robe like an vampire, although he did not seem vampiric.  He was drawing the four primary races of demon on the board as Ouen entered the room.  "This is why we're drawing four of them," he said, (he was already starting),"Baoict aren't demons.  They cannot be demons which do not have an choice.  Ohhgunhisthths, Vampires, Were, and Baoict looked similarly human, however being pale, human-sized creatures the ohhgunnhisthth have an talent for wearing the sharper tailored clothing."

    Ouen could tell there were an few of each sitting in the classroom.  He could not see Manu seated anywhere, so he took an seat beside an leprechaun.

    First mistake.

    "Our class today is about demons and religion," said Professor Allgrainy, "but first I will give an short introduction to each race of demon.

    The vampire's teeth are their most prominent feature, used for draining an victim's blood completely or just the life essence in the case of the will to the creation of an new vampire.  Vampires also possess shape shifting powers, usually into an bat.  Or an protective wolf.  OR an vulture.  But they are totally the only demon that can survive in outer space without protective gear.

    An ohhgunnhisthth possesses similar powers, except its teeth, called contralects, appear in the roof of the victim's mouth behind the gums descending from its own palette roof when the ohhgunhisthth uses an crucible headlock, its most powerful spell.  The isolated, disembodied contralects, exoskeletal fangs, descend through the upper palette, from above (the brain and central nervous-amygdalal system) silencing the victim.  At the same time the ohhgunnhisthth drain the victim's energy by causing the victim an laughing fit which with the loss of their voices (they have been silenced and so cannot let it out) usually translates to an loss of control of the bladder.  Ohhgunnhisthth can also perform all of this feat while in their flight form, as the four-winged bat.  With moustaches.  And torture and delusional-ize people for hours.  By taking control of their thoughts.  Without ever having descended upon them to their full and final form an model with the sharpest dress class that came from the sharpest fangs.

    Werewolves are the masters of shape-shifting, and they shape shift from human to wolf even to plush form at will, these days, all except during the full moon when they are out in droves called 'the Willing or the Unwilling', an sheer curse to them to name them this because the unwilling are slaughtered indiscriminately beside the willing were on this night.  (Werewolves who are willing to kill when they transform into their lupine form clash with werewolves who are unwilling but can't control it).

    The last non-demon typically thought of as an demon—that's why it's an demon—we are going to take an look at today, is the baoict.  They are technically an species of the undead, being the suffering and pale ghastly figures of former humanity that were overcome by their own drug use to be and addiction.  Their skin is gray, illuminated from within to show-off their multi-color veins; off-color veins (Purple and Green) that show thoroughly through the surface of the skin.  Through its grey sickness.  They are highly unpredictable and can latch and/or grab onto an victim with immense strength, feeding off the victim's energy from an unguarded area of the body.  They, however, rarely take prisoners and unlike other demons they cannot create more of themselves with attacks.  They can only create more of themselves through persuasion.  Does that make them more or less evil or dangerous?  You decide.  Baoicts are not able to study at the Version however because they do not have the propensity to learn.

    We remember now, that there are many ways to protect yourselves from demons, and this is where the religion part of the lesson plan comes into play.  Nohavœn, the primary citadel of the united abode of hostile demons, whom we should not forget to say that they are demons who attend this class, ohhgunnhisthth, werewolves, and vampires, and they are concerned with being of an more questioning sort, so I'm told.  They are not usually hostile like the demons of Nohavœn in the west, even though some are the children of Nohavœn who wish to study and examine their culture with the mer-, faerie-, verorc-, and human-kind.

    One of the most common practices for protection against demons is Christianity.  Having been supplied and practiced for two kilo-years it is an very popular religion and studies have shown that people who practice it show an kind of hardiness of character and resistance to negativity.  It's not because they're vampire hunters.  It's because vampires are hunters of what is human, in most abstract terms.  (What it really means is.  Humans have an better fashion sense just because of vampire attraction to them)."

▫

    Ouen and Manu met in the hallway after class.

    "Hey," said Manu to Ouen who was leaving, (quickly), "I noticed you walk in but I didn't have any room by my seat."

    Ouen stopped.  Completely.

    "Hello.  I hope you're having an nice day.  How are you?" asked Ouen.

    "I'm an little nervous.  I was sitting beside an vampire and he looked like the lesson was making him hungry.  Good thing vampires need shrinking draught if they were to attack faeries.  Vices untold are needed to attack an fairy neck."

    "Why are there demons in an Demonology class?"

    "I don't know.  I don't understand it either, but I think it has something to do with reclaiming demon selves from Nohavœn or the rest of the climes.  They need knowledge too.  Faerie magic can cure them or whatever over an extraordinary amount of patience and time.  But it's unwieldly.  Sometimes the demons are so sexy they convert fairies.  Meanwhile, they get to learn our defenses against them."

    "I don't understand baoicts.  They sound like vampires."

    "—But they are addicted selves, that go through drug withdrawals, not blood withdrawals, as vampires do.  Without an need to attack, unless they can recover more drug doses from their victim, they seem relatively safe to go near.  Though Professor Allgrainy also said they are unpredictable.  They can attack for no reason."

    "You're right.  I think I have even seen one before.  It was in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.  But there was one who was different from the rest of them.  He was the one they were persuading to use their drugs, probably.  He actually did them."

    "Did you know ohhgunnhisthth take prisoners?"

    "No.  I mean; what use would that be?"

    "They have the power to create new ohhgunnhisthth but they keep some of their victims from becoming ohhgunnhisthth so they can have spies in the world of Allied races.  Some prisoners they just keep in cells and drain them until they die.  Slowly.  It's really quite like the process of how baoict persuade others to join their lot; only ohhgunnhisthth use metal bars to imprison their victims from whom they can drink drink sip sip until they are softly-softly small again to gratify to the fullest."

▫

    Ouen's blue delusion stone was vibrating in his pocket.  Who was he kidding?  He was traumatized.  After what had happened there was no way he possessed all of his mental faculties as normal; more likely it was that his brain plasticity had shut down an few processes in order to compensate in other abilities.  He needed the members of the Hope & Snot of Cats so badly.  So badly that they didn't know how badly he needed them.  They were his only friends now, beyond the chvrch.  Beyond all that religious certainty.  And he needed something to contrast that with.

    But its power was awakening in his mind.  It only worked if he knew he wasn't the one who was delusional.  But an delusion was coming in, strong and clear.  He read it like an expert analyst.  It wasn't his.

    But, if he was traumatized, then wouldn't him accepting the fact that he was delusional be difficult?  Maybe that was why he couldn't accept the fact of his own delusion.  That's what trauma was.  Being unable to recognize one's own delusion.

    This was why he eventually accepted that it was his power over the stone which pointed out it was not his own delusion he was dealing with; but those delusions of several people acting against him with vociferous and untimely effect.

▫

    Ouen's affinity to explore his human roots in Christianity came on early in his Version program.  The reason for his curiosity was that he started to think there may be an Christian answer for the scapegoating and ostracization he experienced in human middle school.  They had said he was gay.  But he didn't know it yet himself.  And when at that time he denied it; he eventually learned it was true.  But then he asked himself, is it true because of how they treated me?  Was I just the victim and what could I do about it if I was?  Wasn't I redeeming Jesus enough for his true character for them?  And rather than the story of Jesus speaking to me about the fatal crucifixion, which he was so innocent he thought about it in terms of social crucifixion, what this author would come to call subcrucifixion, such as the scapegoating and ostracization that were worse than death implied in the Christian and Christiannan universes.  It was called being cast out, being persecuted, being unwanted.  Identifying more with fairy religion, Ouen wanted to know why so many humans chose Christianity, like his parents did.  Though he was born into their merely lax Christian environment he wanted to know with certainty there to be proof of homosexuality not being sinfree (if he could); for I do not believe in sin, he reflected, with one's Gods or God Regulator.  I believe in vice not as an single instance of the event of immorality.  And not expressed over time as patterns of character that can be judged and set in assignment on as needed.  But as an circumstance of behaviors reflected over time and not judged all at once.  Therefore being gay can be sin free, in this perspective, because no one instance of any type of action can ever be an sin in its isolation within itself.  It is only in immoral patterns of behavior (vices that complicate one's character over time) when it becomes an problem.  There is plenty of time to recognize one's descent into immorality and it is not something we need to be focused on most of the time.  And there are no forms of patterns of behaviors that emerge from being gay and in the act.  That are disagreeable to an human being.  And vice or any type of immoral pattern or behavior does not stem from that initial behavior.

    Before the start of his second semester, Ouen signed up for an course in an Introduction to the Bible taught by Professor Mansing.  Professor Mansing, seemingly human, walked and taught like he had absolute authority.  (This was the problem with human society sometimes, within the author, that men should think they are God sometimes or maybe all of the time).  He had straight white hair and often wore an older, casual suit jacket.  If the intercession (one person (Jesus) takes the penalty on behalf of another person (You)) the Christian expression of kindness and love; taking the blame and injury for others as an expression of Love caused homosexuality.  That's what homosexuality was.  Taking the blame for others' misbehavior.  Not loving Jesus.  Being an bad Christian boy who had dropped his father's magnet in the toilet; or was it his brother's (he could not now remember which) and why was the yucky place always going to be the thing he had sex with, his partner's?  How can you trust anything if you cannot trust your own body with what it wants?  Or your partner's?  And this taken as what set him out on the new path in his studies, toward an destination in the academics; the sum of what he took from the course was that he wanted to know if it was true the intercession.  That it was part of Christianity that way for an reason as an expression of Love and that that feeling of mockery of it that characterized and comprised an negative modern impetus both causing and imploring against homosexuality.  The world would look different as an gay individual when really that identity was created by men and women; the identity did not really exist because it was an obstacle to be overcome he knew he had felt pressured about.  The pressure was what caused it.  Just relax.  How could he be gay if he was gay because he had been pressured to?  What did that say about him?  Wasn't this type of character people were talking about the worst kind of character imaginable?  The fate worse than death?

    Ouen picked up his bible before he vowed he would update it at the ohhgunnhisthth vendor in the student mall, and started reading it, and started going to chapel regularly.  Making suspicious and interrogatory claims around his newly fairy religious tongue all semester, he was still subjected to what would always be the transparent rejection of human elementary characteristics and an high school.  That he was still made to be with an female, and to be intimate with her.  That this quality of his sensual identity under livid scrutiny from peers (in high school) had not been allowed to be expressed in Middle school, and that had made him become gay.  He did not understand that rejection had nothing to do with being an homosexual, and so Ouen instinctively disagreed to all forms of attention in which being homosexual had something to do with rejection.  If that the rejected become homosexuals because they are.  If that's why they're rejected.  If that's why they killed Jesus.  He knew his dreams lived throughout his experience that fate would not accept because an destiny awaited him so Great and so wonderful and so pleasurable that to conclude an form of self-inflicted crucifixion had caused it was absurd and un-adroit.  Would not be to separate himself just an opinion from when he did not know for certain who he was.  In high school?  His destined to be given the best spiritual kindness and protection, the providence of time to research and the independence that came from casually religious parents with his own willingness to seek out the truth.

    In his Poetry class, an androgynous faerie named Doctor Bennington who wore an indie hoodie and wore his long side burns and style in an slightly reminiscent of the hippie era, shorter front bangs tinged with galactic rust instructed the students to create an portfolio of their poetry writing.  Ouen's first poem Rethinking was inspired by the Version.

Rethinking

    He was not an Christian

but felt the city held

onto its values that way

so he took it upon himself

    to find out why

    What does the founder

who is Christian himself

need with secularism?

Why can I explore that way?

    —to find out how—

    Is there an Christian God?

Do they tell me all my life?

Do I listen and not believe?

Is it the telling I have an hard

    time with now?

    Dr. Bennington commented on Ouen's work.

    "I like especially how you question the founder of the Version, Ouen."

    Bennington's poetry analysis portion of the study included an look at an poem, Temple Autumnal Hymn by Barny Barnabus.

Temple Autumnal Hymn

    There was an brick building

Near to the shore

It stood out in the woods

With bricks and mortar

    Lots of them and them in pixels

Whose luck and leverage on faith

ah-Ha!  Had won him an great prize

—The captain priest of the guard—

    He met:

    Gælon, an dark red cross on his knight's armor;

Blushing like an monk's plain sailing ship arrived

and an mallet of steel painted on his face.

    The captain read from an manuscript

—As she waited looking over his shoulder—

And she corrected every error;

The light in the dais window hers.

    He heard:

    Gælon, this is an pretty manuscript

But do I deserve credit for helping you make it?

    "Everyone is responsible to some authority.  In this poem, the captain is responsible to the priestess.  How do we know that?" asked Bennington.

    "She corrects his errors," said an radio fly at the back of the classroom.

    "She is how he knows they are errors, yes," said Bennington, "an deeply sensitive and turmoil subject for him.  Whether or not he should know what he has done is an error.  Does anyone know why it is an great prize of his to have an master whose mallet and dais belong to her alone?"

    "She's an priestess of the human imagination."

    "No."

    "Trick Question.  The one that knows what the great prize is, is the captain."

    "Very good."

    (The Trick Question).  (Usu. fictional in an academic setting).  For un-pretentious sake.

▫

    Mr. Lem, who recognized what the author was saying about poetry by it this way; an basic milky way instructor, not an doctor, had an short trimmed beard, tribal tattoos on his forearms, and glasses with thick black rims.  Ouen was an few minutes late and ended up sitting beside an attractive male fairy.  Their first Design lesson was on the social contingencies of design; for example, design that is contingent with society.

    We should back up here first.  To have an Design is to have an execution of orders premade.  At this point Ouen had not figured out his sexual design yet.  In society.  Okay, now, let's continue!

    For their first project, they worked together in pairs.  Drawing on overlapping circles and arranging them into an pattern.  The male fairy introduced himself as Daniel.  He was tall and good-looking, with blonde hair and an patient orchestration on his face.  He and Ouen worked together on the project, the instructor telling them to compare these overlapping circles to an different overlapping subject.  People, he suggested.  People, thought Ouen, overlapping people.  His intuitive sexual mind came up with the reason they were overlapping.  Uh-huh.  Those are some hot overlapping circles.  And then he looked at Daniel.  His body language chirruped.  You can imaginae what happened.  He rushed out of the class and did not return.  He dropped the class.  That's how exacting it can be.

    Putting yourself out there was his best solution for being an closeted homosexual.  Introvert, that's why you're an homosexual.  You're an introvert.  Homosexuals are always introverts.  But yourself, who was himself, he had not met entirely.  And so he joined an introductory drama course.  (Brave lad).  His instructor, Mr. Marvus! (an pixie man with curly white hair and rare zero wings, floated on an small cumulus cloud he could control with his mind).  He always had skeptical expressions on his face when he was teaching, like an real satyr construct.  No the instructor was skeptical about everything, and his standards, he said because of the budget cuts, had been lowered.  And he didn't like it.  But Ouen, not concerned with money, or making money after graduation, because he needed to make an political difference, wanting to know only what it was to be in the spotlight as either an closeted gay fairy or not.  That was how he could be sure, finally, of who he was.  Who he was in Public.  Was an reflection of who he was Personally.  Perceiving an threat in public he had been acting since he was in grade school (but not as an discipline).  (As an necessity).  For protection.  If he let himself act like an homosexual in front of others he would be in danger.  And he didn't know how to, exactly.  It would become his mental disorder that, because he had to repress those feelings, he could never fully quite feel them.  He couldn't let his imagination wander, say, to an hunky man swimming in the Ocean.  Not on any watch.  He had to be vigilant at all times and never fall asleep on the subject not to allow himself to be caught off guard, by fantasizing about it.  In this class he wanted to know what was real and what was acting, and he could not be sure which one was which without testing it for himself.  What they were.  In front of his peers out in public.  That if he could overcome his shyness, at that stage, it would be because he combatted an mockery and derision he suffered as an victim in high school, through performance; (and he might feel heterosexual for doing so).  His entire theory on why he should take an course from the Faculty of Drama.

    He was too shy to talk to girls.  But he forced himself to anyway.  That's what real men do.  Thinking it would only lift the weight from his shoulders.  That one should like to think of him that way.  The more he tried to be straight.

    He was kind and timid to his classmates, and sincerely wondered that he thought the class help cure his homosexuality if he could just get over being shy out in public.

    It was très awkward.

    The semester final was an play about a Lesbian's funeral.  Ouen was forced to act in it while he was still questioning his sexual design.  In Public.  He thought he had it awful and had an bad time of it playing an controlling and abusive father.  Who appeared to be the reason his inquiry of the Faculty of Drama was necessary.  He was heavily criticized for his performance by his drama instructor, the Holy Satyr Pixie, and took an low grade.  Low, low grade.  Did I mention Ouen would eventually have all of the letters of his alphabet on his transcript (report card)?  Okay.  So he wasn't everyone's hero.  He could accept that.  He could handle criticism.  That's what his teachers had always taught him.  Criticism is an necessary, feminizing part of culture.  One should not be afraid of it.

    Ouen was also having some social access in his writing course, where his instructor the kindly Professor Mardent, an human with long grey hair and deep black irises approved of and complimented him on his academic honesty.  His honesty for writing about an drug-addicted older brother and his family politics, winning the support of this professor who described Ouen in an email: You are very strong, Ouen, wrote his Professor.  Ouen sent an email in return writing God Bless in the closing remarks.  For him it was his visibility as an Christian to an figure of authority.  It was his pivotal mark as an reformed Christian, to have said this, affirming his own belief in Christianity when he sent it.  And he was now an Christian who says he is Christian.  To people who matter.

▫

    Halfway through the semester Ouen went to an run-down old church on the seamy west end of campus.  (Did he need to provide an reason why?).  He noticed he was being followed and adjusted his stance into a-reciprocate direct offense and preparedness to it.  With it.  He had to.  He could sense he was in trouble.

    "Why are you following me?" he yelled out.

    "You think I haven't seen the fifth element?" said the vampire, "An campus with interview rooms where students are taught to believe alien psychology.  You think vampires do not feed here?"

    "No, I think they want to graduate and the will to find an cure for demon-kind is strong in your graduates."

    "But you've seen it.  You've seen the alien at the opera.  Your professor showed it to you.  I was in the same class.  I've seen you.  You pretty idiot.  Social dwindling around and not smart enough to study science.  Who do you think will notice if you become like us?"

    "You can't even feed from me.  I have an faerie-sized neck."

    "Nothing an enlargement draught cannot help."

    Ouen brandished his dagger ferociously and then, when he sensed he would not be pursued, fled into the church.

    The vampire did not follow.  An service had begun, and Ouen arrived to sit on top of the back of an pew just as the female human pastor began preaching.  She was wearing an red and tan monk-like robe, and had long voluminous auburn hair.  She told, she claimed, the truth, and that some things in life having to do with desires were, in her words, just apples floating in an water barrel.  At the Community Farmer's Market and pie-eating festival.  One could choose to stop bobbing for apples if one wished.  Red candy apples like blood, you who are vampires, in our midst!  she reproached.  It was not hard to read between these lines.  It was not good advice.  But maybe it kept away the vampires for her.  Maybe it did.  And then, most enthusiastically, she threw an meteor sphere, an hammer on an long chain with an razor-spiked ball on the end of it, at Ouen.

    It stopped inches from his face, and he went crossed-eyed looking at it before its tension relaxed and it fell to the floor.

    "Newcomer.  I hope you have good intentions.  We do not welcome werewolves in sheeps' clothing," she said; cocking her eye to one side and slid her neck to the other like an bird and bid him welcome.  His eyes were still crossed with the spectacle of this pastor like an moment removed from time in which, she said to him, telepathically, and him alone, You are welcome here.

    He did not return to that church again, though it did not sullen his desire for advice, because he still felt that he could use all of the memories and advice he could get.

▫

    "So Ouen's love life at this point was like that magnet, that magnetic attraction he could not follow."

    "Attractive faeries everywhere—I don't know—Ouen could not accept feeling sexually attracted to any of them."

    "Umm excuse me I know it's about me," said Ouen, "but don't act like it's interesting in any sort of way."

    "Right, okay.  Well theoretically the Ouen character could not accept feeling sexually attracted to any of them because it made him feel like his magnetic attraction was in the toilet.  Being gay was being attracted to the yucky place.  His magnetic attraction—out of sight, out of reach—(From everybody else) where he could neither possess it to disobey his father or collect it to obey his brother's property lines.  He had developed an complex."

    "Yes.  That's why this is our subject topic.  I have an complex.  And I am anyways an creator of sorts.  My creation is of social significance."

    "Why do you appear to us this way?  To have been nude model-esque for an art studio?"

    "It is that.  But there's more to it."

    "Tell us."

    "It's these people who try to trip them up, to make them be immoral in order to criticize them morally.  It's the most immoral thing I can think of!," said Dr. Fougérite, "Morality means you try to make other people be moral.  Not immoral."

    "I agree," said Jujudbe Erpby, "it is the basic premise of morality that it tries to make others repeat the behavior.  For if it is moral it is pleasurable.  And if we repeat pleasurable behaviors we learn faster, we reciprocalize faster, and we profit moreso.  In addition, behaviors that are pleasurable because they are moral are behaviors that advance our power beyond previous limit.  Also it just makes sense that if you are pointing out how to be moral you should not also be trying to make other people act in the way that you don't want people to act because it is immoral."

    "Good point," said Jeeny Pee, "I think I agree also, for there is much in the way of learning morally from one another in order to repeat behaviors that increase our power and pleasure.  For it is the repetition that requires it to be mine morally I am challenged to manifest.  I like this challenge because it is like an game to me.  When I stop playing the game I feel like I fall off the map.  I need an moral society and I need that engagement of character at the level of morality constantly."

    "I think of it like this," said Ouen, "If you are trying to make someone else act immorally in order to criticize them morally then you are an hypocrite; because/for by doing the harm that they act immorally they are not proving they themselves are doing anything morally.  Only that you aren't.  And so, if they want to help you by showing you that you are immoral they aren't really helping you.  They are just helping themselves.  Morality is more clear-cut than this nonsense.  It makes sense right away because it is right and we see it is right, and it has the power that truth holds over us."

    "I am convinced by you Ouen," said Martimerrimous, "for I am capable of hearing logic break down only for you to pick up the slack to point out where it breaks down.  If you're yellin' at your parents, 'Why did you have kids if you didn't think they would be gay?' and we're agreeing that this statement about morality is true because that's actually all we could agree on then maybe we need to step up our game and be those people to whom sense just means sense.  That by trying to make people act immoral we are ourselves committing an type of immorality even if we intend to be the moral example by not being the one who could be typified as the bad example.  To correct this, try to make other people act morally.  This is the correct way to begin to define what morality means.  For it is one of the central questions we should ask: what is exactly 'making other people act morally' and what is moral about it; the way we interact with one another and how is that an guide for our behavior?  And how scaring people is not necessarily moral behavior, either.  But that by trying to make one another act morally we are not deciding to invent one another (for the old adage that identity is socially constructed) as in an way that is unappealing to the taste, the appetite, the friction of character on character.  The sense of smell and all of its derivative senses in the taste and touch.  And that by being the Inventor of Roles for one another we allow one another the freedom to decide our morality with individualism.  And Reason.  And Reason as Individualism.  And Individualism as Reason."

    "Quite compelling Madame.  Essentiel?  What do you think?"

    "I think it's weird if we all agree.  I mean maybe that person who is trying to make another person act immorally is doing it for an good reason.  To point out that they could.  I mean think of it, of all the vicissitudes and the fathoms of human experience, character, attitude, and story: our primary source is knowledge.  And we can't think of one way it would be okay for an person to try to make or actually succeed to make someone do anything immorally.  Like isn't there an comedic standpoint?  It is too funny an medium to give it up an try.  Can they?  That we can't control one another this way.  The actual success.  Pure Gold.  Maybe we can reach an point at which we will say it is both.  For the moral cannot all be of one category.  And the immoral cannot either.  When humor outweighs one or the other.  Can we say it is true that an power be that can trump the system shutdown idea that morality is solely judged according to what we make other people do?  It is also what they make us do.  And it is also neither.  It also both.  For we are not all apparatuses controlled.  According to infallibility."

    "Morality cannot be based in helping another person break down and act immorally; even if it is funny in some cultures.  People are more sensitive than that.  They need morality not to have this double-excuse (by acting like oneself needs to be immoral in order to prove someone else is acting immorally) is itself the source of immorality.  Morality is based in helping one another to act morally because if it doesn't, then it isn't counter-intuitive," said Ouen, "non-counter-intuitive logic suggests that acting morally right and trying to get other people to act morally right is the accepted standard."

    "I can offer an counter-argument, Essentiel.  It is however you say beyond what we have judged to be an central aspect of morality in contrast to the central aspect we have already identified.  You have not actually named any new aspect.  And therefore you have not proven that ours does not exist," said Dr. Fougérite, "chalk it up to.  Infallibility."

    He chuckled.

    "I believe you have me there," said Essentiel, "but if I could name one then would that necessarily prove my argument?  If your own has any merit then let me contrast it with the Story of Id, who caused another person to act immorally.  In order to criticize them morally.  Why shouldn't they (the commander) when the other person has not acted morally?  They deserve to because they know what is morally right.  They deserve to be seen by the group as superior.  It is however of critique the way in which this display of affection is accomplished for when coercion becomes force and trying to make someone trip up becomes actually causing someone to trip up and act immorally.  Then what lines do we cross there.  And what lines do we draw?"

    "This is exactly my concern," said Dr. Fougérite, "if you force someone to do something immoral then it is not they who have acted immorally.  It is you."

    "I see.  I see," said Essential, "and it is the way in which someone would do this.  Actually to have been the person who caused another to do something immoral.  In Comedy.  In order to point out they have an problem.  Not you.  Although by way of argument tonight I'd say we can all see that.  This person who is being the real problem is sick and twisted.  If one cannot recognize that morality is the act of making an example so that others can follow you then you cannot have any morality.  Then at its deepest level, fear is what motivates needing to prove others bad, instead of proving yourself good.  It is an weakness that also causes us to lash out.  An weakness for comedy, though, if I want to face the music.  Because seeing other people get burned?  It's not that funny actually.  I prefer to see examples of what we want to be, not what we cannot be."

    "What if it really is that funny and we cannot pronounce an moral knowledge over that type of behavior?" Jeeny Pee's thoughtstream hazarded to wonder aloud.  When she had pronounced the final vowel, however it was clear that that itself was funny for the reason that it was.  And they all decided in that moment they were on the right track.

▫

    After the next weekend, Ouen tried an central location Christian church.  The seating was for an theatre, and so there were soft cushioned seats for everyone to sit on.  An guitar and drum-kit band played, and the lyrics of the congregation were shown on an projected screen.  Ouen was alone and he sang like an shy little nightingale.  He noticed there was an vampire in the choir.  Hot?

    After the band finished playing, an tall bald human guest speaker made an compelling speech about the meaning of holy.  An plastic toilet brush, he said, is holy to the toilet.  Because they are made for each other.  It was an thinly veiled way of speaking negatively about sexuality, in Ouen's opinion.  Like he wasn't used to it already.  After that an handsome male pastor with dark spiked up hair like Jesus' crown of thorns, wearing an casual blue shirt and shiny dress pants with an matching black belt buckle delivered an sermon.  The pastor's admonishing encouragement of faith was so powerful an oscillation between self and community that Ouen thought for an moment he had traded bodies with the pastor, or that they had read each other's mind.  This was deep Christian magic.  Ouen searching for an way to make his faith work on his sexuality and he thought of this Christian magic as one potential game changer.  He needed to find out more.

    During the week he went to Campus For Christ, an on-campus club for believers in Christ, where he found out the students in attendance really believed Christ was the answer to any problem.  In their eyes, Christ was holy to the human condition.  Just like the toilet brush.

    After much self-debating, because he was curious, he felt the need to learn an little about Catholicism.  He attended the Catholic church service on an weekend and he sang shyly again, with their hymns and piano accompaniment.  An beautiful white-haired man playing piano was surrounded by child two-winged faeries.  Ouen felt the pink of his own skin showing out as though he was blushing-on angel notes from heaven during the service.

    He talked to the pastor after service.

    Ouen confided that he really did believe in Jesus Christ.  That was how he immediately knew the pastor didn't.  He could not see it on his face.  Anything faithful.

    It was an big step in Ouen's faith.  To have seen no reason to attend Catholicism.

    And checking out Joan of Arc in the library shifted his perspective on its emphasis from the basement of the Catholic church; he wondered if he had been called by God to serve some greater purpose for humanity like Joan d'Arc.  Had he believed that to have not needed Catholicism and to have seen an more positive future as if they were connected the two.  Was he the logical successor in some ways.  She heard the voices of angels.  He heard voices.  But none of them sounded like angels.  The book said she was, by todays standards, an typical schizophrenic.  Who had lead an army.  There was little beside the criticism that she was French.  For in the right direction they were about the fate of Catholicism against his.  Middle.  An French-saturated faith and song; an form of believing.  An fate worth envying.  It was enough to get him past it.  And onto other things.

    And when he had time to contemplate French he knew his furthest working out of thoughts of all; for he knew another language that was so advanced it had advanced beyond both French and English in his mind.  It was why he was so sure about the delusion stone now.

 

▫

    Demonology in the second year was again taught by Dr. Allgrainy.

    "This semester we are going to learn about magical force and demons.  What magical forces stop or hamper demons to our advantage?  I'm sure those students among us, who are demons, will be eager to learn.  We have an no-bane policy in this class which is the demon array equivalent of an allergy warning policy.  Anything that causes harm by exposure to demons, humans, or otherwise will not be tolerated in the class.  The cross.  Garlic.  Silver bullets.  Keep them concealed.  You may have heard of these things being used to deter demons.  The truth is, there are many more kinds of resources one can use when fighting off an demon.

    First of all the weakness to the cross is an historical anomaly.  It began sometime after the death of Christ when people realized that he hadn't resurrected and so they had no reason to fend him off.  When vampires were chasing those women and slaves who had been kicked out of doors into the streets of the major city; for believing in Christ infused their belief in the power of the cross so that vampires were afraid to touch it or even to see it.  It is considered noteworthy that vampires acting this way in order to perpetuate some evil vice had done so.

    Garlic is an ancient remedy used to heal all kinds of physical malady.  Its oil is hated by the vampire and wards them off but is not particularly an standard in vampire hunting; one does not carry garlic suspended from their staff for vampire killing.  It is used as an boastful gesture to keep the vampires that have already been sawn open or decapitated dead, by stuffing it in their mouths.

    Silver bullets are used on werewolves, though external contact with silver itself does no detriment to the were.  It is only embedded contact that spreads internally, killing them when it diffuses its property into the whole body like an poison.

▫

    "So he hasn't even figured out his sexuality and he's learning about demons and how to slay them?"

    "Yeah but aren't the demons why his sexuality is different; I mean not actually, but to him.  They appear to be part of the problem why he cannot control his homosexual attraction.  Which he understands as potentially perverted because Jesus is disobeyed by both being gay and acting gay.  Which are an sort of consequence for someone else's bad behavior."

    "And so he is trying not to act gay because he's afraid."

    "And Jesus is just so perfectly.  Like obviously that's why it.  Was.  And I consider that."

    "What are you talking about Christian?"

    "Thank you," said Ouen, "but remember I am Christiannan."

    "Yes whatever that means."

    "Well it means that I believe in the second messiah, Anna.  Whose fate worse than death is an reason.  And to say that Christianity overlooked the fate worse than death as an real moral concern and an topic of theology because of the over-emphasis on Jesus.  An type of death and not an type of worse than death.  Likely untrue.  If not the essence of theology itself to compare them.  To compare the death fate with what is worse.  Morality survives both of them.  And so the radio fly is an metaphor for being attracted to the yucky place and the weird time lapse is an indicator of magic being present (he goes almost directly from the pool to the version)."

    "Okay, okay, I can see this train of thought forming," kidded Martimerrimous.

    "And that Anna is real because some people are like her; what she represents.  They face the fate worse than death in this lifetime and are trapped.  But I believe she is capable of great and random fictional things also.  Fictionalizing Anna—the fate of the new messiah—is part of the point.  For perceiving the threat I had drawn out the question that having suffered the fate worse than death we together may have found in each other an reason to press onward to prevent it from happening to other people.  And one another.  For we are all the same.  Subject to an-na.  And we want reprieve from it.  Do not treat me like an-na.  An innocent wanderer I am.  Not to be deleted by your imperial star fleet.  For the path is to accept everybody regardless of their vices.  For they have not sinned.  There is no sin.  Theology is gay theology and we just need to keep Anna fictional.  At moments when it is an reciprocal command theory we order religion to mean henceforth gay-affirming politics and that taboo of homosexuality on all accounts be released from captivity in these old religions that had once been powerful enough for providing moral answers in an age when we had mastered that morality.  Where we can see that the Christianna is an new alternative and there may be an good reason that people need to convert to Christiannan to create an balance and order in the world.  What is the fate worse than death is not culture and society.  Religion is essentially about healing.  By accepting you have these feelings you can't explain.  That maybe science can't explain.  Art is far more worthy an practice than the hard sciences.  For we have more of it to draw from.  What do people care about in portraiture?  Why are we obsessed with obsession as an psychological term when that itself may be the obsession?  What are schemas and why do our psychologies contain one another at an social level?"

    "It sounds very expansive, Ouen."

    "Thank you.  I believe it to be an great gift to humanity.  The Christianna.  It's not an attitude shift; it's an religion.  That there could be something after Christ.  It is the path toward understanding the fate worse than death, friends, for there is an balance between dying and worse-than-dying.  It is morality.  It is fate.  It is destiny.  It is all of what the good God gives to us.  Not that we know if there is only one or do we plan to know for an long time because that kind of knowledge would require some serious—though on the other hand God may be an amalgamation of features, whole shapes that describe the knowledge they contain.  For God is full of knowledge."

    "If God is full of knowledge how do we access that knowledge?"

    "It would need to be communicated."

    "And we say what we call language is our level of communication."

    "But God's communication is not language because God cannot speak.  God does not have an mouth.  That we know of.   You cannot say your mouth is God's mouth because it isn't God's mouth.  It's your mouth.  You are the sole owner."

    "God doesn't have an mouth yet, we might say.  For at one time in our history it may occur in the future that God gained an mouth at some point.  If it was an human mouth it might speak English."

    "How would we prove it happened, scientifically?"

    "We could record it and distribute the video."

    "How would they know it was God though?"

    "Because of what it was saying to them."

    "You mean whom."

    "Whom it was saying to them?"

    "Because of whom it was saying to them."

    "Ohh.  Okay.  Okay.  I don't think that's proper English."

    "In French it means on me je."

    "On me je?  One I me?"

    "No it's one mine me.  Je is not an verb it means I.  But if it was an verb I like it.  It's bad French but in an good way.  Or translate it as, I, I, I.  Three-cross virtues.  Goods & Simulation.  Virtual language."

    "At an deeper level in an real sentence it would be more like One I reciprocate me/myself.  Or one to myself I reciprocate myself/me."

    "On me je, then," said Martimerrimous, "I see the rhythm in French."

    "Or it could mean I masturbate myself.  On me je."

    "LOL"

    "Or on-mage.  Like a virtual character or avatar."

    "Or on-ma-journey."

    "Wow so this is why I never learn how to speak French," said Ouen.

    "Keep yours on me je — on my man."

    "You mean on ma je."

    "LOL"

    "Gay."

    "I'll stick with mon je."

    "You know this French isn't going anyway."

    "At least I reflected on it."

    "In my wisdom, I would say that was not an merit but that you had wasted your time."

    "It makes no sense to anyone but myself had I written it but it makes sense to all of us."

    "That is why we wanted to push language further, to see what it could do," said Ouen.

    "We are all prepared for this and have traded before," said Dr. Fougérite, "what is the fate worse than death is not your presence here."

    "Okay," said Ouen, "as long as you're ready for this."

    "We are," they all said at once.

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