CAROL'S BIG DAY OUT

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  "I was born crying but I shall die laughing."

                                                               Sri Nisargadatta

 

 

 

 

  Carol was in one hell of an absolutely foul, dirty rotten stink of a mood when she burst in through the office door of the publishing house where she worked. She had severe anger in her embodied constitution, there was absolutely no doubt about that. Her mutating life was on the scrap heap and whichever way she turned she was having to wade through ten mile high piles of mental, emotional and material poo. Carol was in pain and like just about every other human on the planet, she was suffering with her attempts to totally reject that pain. All of the romantic fun in her life appeared sadly and sorrowfully, to be long gone. Blown away by the incessant vicissitudes of living. That bewildering, gut wrenching angst of being a lonely, separate human identity had her psyche trapped. She was cognitively at that common, street level, stereotyped, tumultuous, mortal squeeze of a worrying level that humans know so well. Despair, some call it. The mental turmoil currently going on inside of her was sheer, anxiety invoking agony. Life was a soulless panic attack. Problem! Problems! Problems! That was all that she had. She was deep into a deterioration phase with her sentient existence and that irked the lady monumentally. Spiritually, she felt that she was about as defunct as the politicians and the grey suited screamers at the stock exchange appeared to be. Earth was pure hell. Never mind the blue sky and the woolly white clouds that drifted lazily through the azure blue sky. The planet was a nuthouse and the blood and bone lunatics which it hosted were most definitely on the loose. Worst of it all though, she was one of them. Apparently. Jesus! Was she ever pissed off with it all.

Some road rage bastard had exacerbated her angry woes by cutting in front of her on the freeway and shooting off up an exit ramp at a rocket like speed. She had had to break suddenly and the car behind her had almost slammed into the rear of her aging, beginning to rust vehicle. The episode had nearly scared the inner shit out of her, as near accidents involving humans in motor cars usually do. Her thumping, pounding heart had almost popped out of her throat from the totally unexpected, unwelcome, shocking horror of it all. Hot butterfly terror had spread its way around her insides and filtered its way down through her intestines. She had very nearly had a bowel evacuation. It had been an extremely close call.

  Aside from inheriting the frightful ire of all of that, when she neither wanted nor needed it, she had had an absolute ripper of an early morning fight with her lover Tom. That was what had triggered her angry, fluctuating to sad blues and that was what she had been thinking about when the lunatic on the freeway had cut her off. She had actually been in a bit of a daze, so preoccupied with her thinking that it had almost fatally affected her reaction time. The whole thing had happened like a sub dream within the crazy nightmare called life that she was currently experiencing.

The two of them, she and Tom, had been under increasing pressure of late. The nonsensical pressure was beginning to manifest itself by escalating the intensity and frequency of the heated arguments going on between them. They had become like two countries who were massing their troops and weapons on their borders in preparation for a full scale war. They had gone fundamentalist. She really adored Tom though and she didn't want their relationship to go down the karmic drain like her last one had. It seemed like everything in her life was going wrong though and she was deeply and angrily irked at her apparent powerlessness in regard to controlling her crisis. The bills had been piling up, Tom was coming up to his final exams for his university degree and she had been and still was struggling with the awkward personality of a horrible new boss. The superbitch Helen, Carol called her internally. Her mum was also a nagging pain. Whenever the old girl rang, she was always hen pecking Carol about getting married.

  "You're getting on now dear!," she'd say, 30 seconds into every call.

  "You're almost thirty! You don't want to leave it too long before you start a family. Sixty percent of marriages do work you know love. You don't want to listen to what the knockers say. When are you and Tom coming up for a visit? You know we'd love to see you both. Your dad's always asking when you're coming up next."

This was her mum's standard opening paragraph on each of her weekly, religious calls. It forced Carol to go on the defensive before they could share anything of real interest between themselves. This irked her to the depths of her soul. It was the same irritating position that the superbitch Helen was continually putting her in. Always getting her to explain in arty farty detail why she approved some scripts and not others. Always insisting on talking a technical, business language which was devoid of emotion and then inevitably coming out with what appeared to be her favourite statement whenever Carol approved anything, being;

  "I disagree! It won't sell a rank copy. It's sentimental crap!"

  The facts were though that Tom was either studying or working at his casual job. She had also taken to doing overtime whenever she could get it because they desperately needed the money. Reading for such long periods was starting to get to her eyes. They were often sore even after she'd put drops in them. Sometimes she got rotten headaches, particularly behind her left eye. She did wonder though whether these could be due to the copious amounts of coffee that she'd recently been consuming. The stories too were beginning to bore her. So often, it was the same old stuff, over and over again. In a way they reflected the re run pattern that was going on out in the street. Petrol had gone up again, the new GST tax had increased the cost of living and the weather had recently changed from the usual dry summer heat into a morbidly uncomfortable, sticky humidity. She was sick to death of sweating when outside and tired of getting the sniffs from the airconditioning in her office. Tom needed this book or that book and they were all so damn expensive. They were running two cars, both of which had required heavy maintenance expenditures in the previous couple of months.  It was a kind of insanity really, the way that they were living. She couldn't help but wonder sometimes if it was all worth it. Periodically, she had daydreams about an easier lifestyle in a simpler world. Like being in a clean, little house in the country by a warm fire and maybe, just maybe, a baby sucking on her breast. Her good bloke she envisioned would always be home on time and his well paid work would never interfere with their private lives. They would have it off regularly and forever as they blissfully continued to experience each other's souls in a de pressurised environment. Such visionary scenes appeared in her mind's eye as a kind of heavenly fantasy. The urge to have a compatible partner to breed with in this picture world is powerful human stuff. Somewhere deep down inside of her she was now totally aware that she really did want to have a kid. She'd tried to deny it to herself. The gnawing, burning urge that was going on deep down there inside of her though had quickly bubbled back up. How though? How could she bring into or cope with a kid in such a pressure cooker of violent lunacy? That was her problem. How to change a negatively geared reality to suit her desire to breed situation.

  She knew full well that her mother was desperate for a grandchild and she knew that her mother knew that she and Tom were the best chance of providing her with one. Her two younger brothers had been overseas for years. She was aware from the rare communications that she had with them that it would be aeons before they returned to Australia to settle down. They had both gone spiritual and were almost permanent residents of some ashram somewhere in India. So everytime that she spoke with her mother she would have to repeat the same old story. She would have to tell her that she and Tom were super busy and that they weren't even seeing that much of each other, let alone being able to visit anyone else. This was in fact the truth because Tom's casual job was mostly night work. He had only been doing it for two to three months and it had had severe repercussions on their relationship, what with everything else that was going on. Their sex life had suffered tremendously and their romance seemed almost dead. A victim of the circumstances under which they were living. Even when they had the odd meal together he was either too tired to talk or his mind was on what it was that he had to study next. If he wasn't working or at his desk in the flat he was down at the library buried up to his eyeballs in books. She felt almost like she had a phantom lover, not a real solid, hairy chested, warm blooded one. She just wished that he'd give her some attention for once and turn her pages like he turned the pages of his stupid books. She knew it would all change once his exams were over, though at times like these she had serious doubts if they could make it to that stage. Their fight this morning had been exceptionally gross. It had had a new hostile, violent intensity imbued in it. They had really vented themselves on each other. It had been much worse than the other ones of late. Something he had said kept bouncing around her mind.

  "Get off my (expletive) back will you! I can't do anymore than I'm doing!"

  It was so crazy because she had really wanted to hug with him and roll around the bed and make passionate love, like they do in the movies. Instead they had fought like wild dogs. He had been still half asleep because he had studied for God knows how long after he'd gotten home from work. She remembered vaguely him kissing her on the cheek when he'd returned from work. She herself though had been so tired that rather than waking up as she'd planned to do, she had instead drifted off into a deep sleep. She felt like a bitch for having set him off though she wished with all of her heart that they could be like they used to be. Like two kids frolicking in a playground, touching and having it off at just about every available opportunity. The power inherent in the effortless intimacy involved in early love affairs is addictively dreamlike and Carol still hankered for more of that taste. It irked her that she needed reassurance that he still loved her, though in her innermost being she knew that he did. He was the best bloke that she'd ever been with. He was gentle, kind and earnest and she didn't want to lose him. Carol was afraid though that if things kept going the way that they were going, that she would.

What was happening was that the situation that they were in was bringing out their dark sides. From her previous experiences she was well aware that the violent emergence of people's dark sides usually preceded their separation. Thinking about this was making her a most unhappy, blue lady. She was also precariously emotional and her perception of the world was that it was an absolute bitch of a bastard of a place. She felt as though the external reality which was being projected onto her was alien, hostile and impossible to understand. It was so confusing, so up and down, so changeable. So unbelievably frustrating, so out of control, so unreliable and so frightfully violent. Lately the changes had been coming at her so furiously fast that she was struggling to catch up with the time to adjust to them. Her world had gone mad and what was happening in the world was totally mad and what was the point of enduring it all day after day after day. One had to question whether or not life was really worth persevering with in such an abominable nuthouse, she felt. Prolonged suffering wasn't funny, not through human eyes.

  "Good morning Cas!," gay Gary called out to her jovially as she passed his office.

  "Hey Gaz," she mumbled back to him, somewhat depressedly.

Gary came to his door and looked at the back of the forlorn figure that was negotiating the passageway. He liked Carol and it had become increasingly obvious to him of late that she was going through a rather rough patch.

  "Cheer up love!," he called out to her.

  "Only 8 odd hours to go and you're free again for another glorious work free weekend."

Carol turned and smiled feebly but said nothing as she disappeared into her tiny office. She had felt something down below and it was absolutely the last thing that she needed, although it explained why she was feeling so emotionally haywire.

  "Shit!," she mouthed off as she threw her bag violently onto her desk. The bag slid along a bit and knocked her mouse off its pad. The mouse kept going over the edge of the desk until, held only by the white cord that connected it to her computer, it hung halfway to the floor.

  "Shit! Shit! Shit!," she exploded angrily at it. Inside, she told herself that she just couldn't take any more.

She picked the mouse up wishing that it had been her hanging there and then, close to tears she grabbed her bag. Still in temper she rummaged through the bag until she discovered what she wanted. She turned violently heading for the toilets and almost bowled gay Gary over in the process. Her cheeks were deep red and it was obvious that she was in one hell of a stinky mood. He had come to check on her and was standing in the passageway like a white monolith. A look of concern was etched into his handsome, Hudsonish, homosexual face.

  "Are you alright Cas?," he asked.

She mumbled something and brushed past him. She was very fond of Gary. In her present condition though she felt incapable of talking to anyone. She made the toilets and did what she had to do. Sitting on a loo she buried her head into her lap and started to silently sob. She had not felt so hopelessly low in a long, long time. In her mind she started planning some sort of escape. What she needed to do she felt was to take some time off and go and sit in a park or on the beach.  She had some time owing from the extra hours that she'd recently done. She had just decided to ask the superbitch for half a day off when she heard the washroom door open.

  "Are you in here Carol?," a stern voice demanded.

It was Helen. The superbitch.

Carol clenched her fists and gritted her teeth. It was dead lucky that she wasn't armed.

  "Yes?," she answered politely.

  "Have you finished that report yet?"

  "No! I'll have it for you this morning."

  "Can you hurry it up please? I'm due at the meeting at one but I want to leave here by eleven. I've something to do on my way out there. I've also put a new script on your desk. It came to us unsolicited. I want you to look at it today and do a quick report on it. It doesn't look that long so you shouldn't have any problems finishing it by the end of the day."

Carol was just about ready to start screaming. Instead she answered politely in the affirmative again.

  "Are you going to sit in there all morning Carol?," Helen then asked her.

  "No Helen! I'll be off in a minute," she answered, with a short, raspy tone.

  "Very well then."

The door then closed and Carol sat simmering like a well cooked stew. She could not believe that she had been put on this Earth to go through what she was currently going through. Why was everything fucking up? Why would absolutely nothing go right for her? Was God or the higher power or whatever toying with her? Playing some sick game to see how much shit she could take before she completely cracked. Those were the questions which kept bouncing around her brain. Some lines of a song that she used to overhear her former teenage brother's listening to also flashed through her mind .

THERE IS NO WAY OUT OF HERE, ONCE YOU COME IN HERE....YOU'RE IN FOR GOOD!

was one of them. She even heard clearly the heavy, morose, droning music that accompanied the lyrics.

  Angrily, she stood up and flushed the toilet. Then she went out and washed her hands and returned to her little office. She attacked her bag again and found her cigarettes. Normally, she never smoked until morning tea. She only had about five to seven a day, always after meals or with coffee or tea. Her office was two floors up and it had a little balcony attached to it. She opened the door to go outside and immediately an overpowering wave of sticky, oppressive heat blasted her in the face. For just after nine in the morning, it was absolutely ridiculous.

  "Oh shit!," she screamed, innerly cursing the law which stated that she could not fag inside.

  She lit up and puffed away madly on the horrible stick like her life depended on it. Looking down at the street, she saw humans walking briskly around in all directions. It was easy for her to spot those who were late for work because they were running as soon as the don't walk signs changed. She observed the traffic and felt the noise of various motorised engines reverberate throughout her embodied soul. All in all the scene worsened her depression. When she went back inside she was asking herself why people lived the way that they did. She was questioning why people put themselves in such stressful situations in order to earn paper money which enabled them to be good little, obedient consumers. Consumers who, minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day, made more profit for the mad dogs who ran the mad dogs who ran the other mad dogs who ran the multinational conglomerates which ran the super environmentally destructive, hell bound, global Earth economy.

She was asking herself why she herself was really doing what she was doing and what would she be doing if she wasn't doing what she was doing and she just could not get a satisfactory answer from her mind. Not in the condition that it was currently in and not in an environment where survival depended on money. It was almost as though, in the society in which she lived, having a stressful job and being an obedient, run around consumer was akin to being obedient to the system. Of being loyal to the group mind consensus of what perceptually exists as reality and what a citizen is supposed to do within that outer, physical reality. Carol thought that the danger to the dark multinational powers, whose sole interest was profit, was that if idle citizens thought deeply enough some of them might realise stuff. They might cotton on to the fact that there was quite possibly a dirty, dark conspiracy going on in the world and that a select greedy and ignorant few who were super addicted to accumulating golden profits were the ones who were running it. These ones really didn't give a shit about the masses of people, although their political stooges professed to often enough. The conspirators worshiped enormous profits and the people worshiped their peanut income jobs and that was the way things should be. Money was life. Money ensured physical survival. Money was identity. Money was reality. Money was where it was at, until y'died. Apparently.

  Carol sat down, rather astounded at the thoughts that she was currently having. She had never considered herself to be a practising rebel and she really did like her job. She loved books and had been an avid reader from an early age. She had read across an extraordinarily broad range of both mainstream and alternative stuff, in both the fiction and non fiction areas. This had broadened her mind considerably. She was a very smart and a pretty radical girl. She was also, a bit of a witch. She knew about the dark stuff because it was everywhere on the Earth. It was in the matter. She knew about the light stuff too. She'd been in love with creations before and she still was in love with a specific creation and other creations as well. Some of them organic, some of them not. Despite the sophistication of her insights though, she still felt hopelessly trapped. Like a male spider in a Black Widow's web. She feared that pressurised capitalistic materialism was going to destroy her thing with Tom. It was going to eat them all up until there was nothing sane left in them. Deep down, like many other humans, she also felt that pressurised capitalistic materialism might destroy the entire Earth, thereby finishing every love relationship on the planet. God knows, there were enough warnings about that coming from ancient prophets, the grass roots and many high placed, eminent environmentalists.

She started running cost saving, anti-desire thoughts through her mind. Did she and Tom really need this or that? Did they really need to blow nearly 50 to a hundred plus bucks a week on take aways? Did they really need 2 cars? Did they really need a mortgage? Couldn't she bus it to work, and so on. Eventually, she drifted somewhat absent mindedly into her work. She had to force herself to focus on it, though she managed. By 10.30 she had the report written. Hitting the right buttons on her keyboard, the computer's printer willingly spat it out. Somewhat reluctantly, she took it up to Helen's office and placed it on her desk. Helen was not in the office and she was rather glad about that. Feeling quite relieved and considerably less upset than she'd been earlier on, she then went down to the tea room to make a coffee. There she found gay Gary. He smiled at her and they had a bit of a chat about life and all of that. She apologised for being rude to him earlier on. Gary though dismissed it as trivial. Carol unveiled to him why she had been so upset and withdrawn.

  "There's some bastards on the freeway!," Gary commented.

Carol told him a bit more, mainly about Helen.

  "She seems exceptionally bitchy today!," Gary answered her.

  "I don't think things are going so well for her at home."

  "They're not for me either!," Carol retorted.

She told about her blue with Tom. Gary and Tom had met a few times. The gay man was a bit surprised. He liked Tom and he was very fond of Carol. He thought that they made a splendid couple.

  "I don't know that we're going to last!," Carol sniffed at him.

  "I used to be so sure that we would, but not now."

  "Of course you will Cas!," Gary practically exploded.

  "Brian and I went through a hell patch not long back. I thought that he was the biggest bitch on Earth and he thought that I was the biggest asshole that's ever lived. Actually, I took that as a bit of a compliment!," Gary informed her coyly with a bit of a wink. "We stuck at it though and ever since then it's been better than ever. The sex has just been something special! You and Tom will do the same, I can tell."

Carol looked unconvinced.

A serious expression came across gay Gary's handsome face.

  "Sometimes you have to fight Cas," he said.

  "Not necessarily outwardly, but inwardly, you know? You've got to fight for what you love about yourself and the other person. Sometimes, love, loves a good fight. It helps, love to grow."

Carol smiled at him and thought about how beautiful he was. She could feel his concern and she was touched by it. She turned and was about to leave when Helen burst in through the door brandishing her recently completed report. Helen did not look happy, as usual.

  "Carol! This is a bit skimpy, isn't it?," said the reddish faced superbitch, somewhat angrily.

  "It was a skimpy book Helen!," Carol answered her.

  "Even so, he's one of our best clients Carol! He's sold a (expletive) lot of copy, you know?"

  "It's a skimpy book Helen and it's a re run of other plots that he's used. If I bought that as a book I would be disappointed with it and that's what I've said!"

  "That's not going to do us much good in renegotiating his contract Carol!"

  "Perhaps we should tell him to come up with something more original then Helen!"

  "Hmmmpphhh!," went Helen as she turned on her heels and left.

  "Make sure that you finish that other script today!," she almost yelled over her shoulder.

  "And the report!"

Carol felt a delicate hand on her shoulder. When she angled her head, Gary was grinning broadly. He showed her a clenched fist.

  "Well done Cas!," he said.

  "I'm proud of you. If ever a rude and abrupt bitch needs bringing down, that one does!"

  They had a bit of a giggle on their way back to their offices, like workmates do when they've stuck one up the boss. Carol took her coffee, another cigarette and the introductory letter to the manuscript that she had to read out onto her porch. The humidity was worse than ever and after the first few drags the cigarette tasted like shit. She looked at it strangely and mentally asked herself why she was smoking the damn thing. Some sweat ran off her brow and she wiped it off with the back of her hand. It really was appalling she felt that she had to stand in the blazing sun to indulge in her filthy habit. When she heard a screech of brakes she looked down at the street and saw that Helen had almost been involved in a car accident. Her boss had been pulling out from her parking spot and another driver had almost collected the side of her vehicle. The other driver, a road rage male, had stopped and was out of his machine. He was standing inbetween the driver's seat and the opened front door. Carol could just hear what he was saying. He was extremely rude and extremely irate.

  "Stupid (expletive) bitch! Why don't you watch what you're (expletive) doing? You stupid bloody bitch!," he yelled angrily at a head bent Helen.

Then he got back into his car, slammed the door and took off rapidly down the road. His car's wheels squealed as he did so. Carol noticed that it was a while before Helen drove off. The thought ran through her that she wasn't the only one around the place that was having trouble keeping her mind on the job. She remembered what Gary had said and it occurred to her that she and Helen might be having a similar sort of experience. It irked her though because she had no desire to be someone else's punching bag, a position which workers with a disturbed boss above them sometimes found themselves in. She dismissed her thoughts in an attempt to read the cover letter which she had brought outside with her. It was boiling hot on the balcony though and thus she beat a hasty retreat to the sanctuary of her air conditioned office.

  With a cup of cold water which she obtained for free from the upside down, plastic bottle in the hallway, she sat down again at her desk. Carol scrutinised the manuscript's introductory letter. It was not from the writer or a literary agent, rather it was from the writer's 15 year old son. The son told, in relatively neat handwriting, that his old man was now deceased. He explained that his dad had been very fond of writing stories, though he had never cracked the big time. In fact, he had never made the small time either. The kid related that his male parent had written numerous scripts over a 20 year period, all of which were rejected by publishers. Still though, the lad told, his dad had kept writing because he absolutely loved making up stories. Just before he died, Carol read, the old man had told his son to run a print out of his final yarn and send it off to the (expletive) publishers. The lad had chosen Carol's firm because he liked their name. He had also sent out two other copies. He wrote that he had read the story and that he didn't mind it. He mentioned that before he died his old man had said that if anybody should happen to want the story that the rights belonged to him. In summing up he expressed that his dad had lived in the clouds a bit.

  "Oh God!," Carol sighed heavily. She was a 21st century lady with her solid feet on the solid ground and the cerebral fantasy stuff really wasn't her daily cup of tea. She cursed Helen again because she obviously hadn't read the letter. The firm didn't normally deal in this genre. It ran strongly through Carol's brain that the last thing that she needed on a day like she was having was to have to wade through some failed writer's fantasy stuff.

  "Oh shit!," she exclaimed loudly when she saw the book's title.

It said.

 

ET WRITE BOOK

 

                                                                                By Eddie Titt

 

 

 

 

  "Oh shit!," sighed Carol again.

  "Mother of God!"

She looked up at her air conditioned ceiling.

  "Why me, you bitch?," she said to it.

  "Why me?"

Then she summoned all of her mental strength and with sheer feminine willpower forced herself to read.

 

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  Sydney is a big town by Australian standards. Population wise it's not much compared to joints like Tokyo, Mexico City, London, Bombay, New York or LA. By Australian standards though, Sydney is big. Compared to it, Perth, on the other side of the country is a bit like a large suburb. As is sometimes said in this modern era though, what does size matter? Then again, it's not where one is on the perceived outside that really counts. Trouble and death come to both the rich and poor, no matter where they live. It's where one is on the inside that the real story of  life is being unfolded. How big, how evolved, how fearless, how powerful is the soul light inside of the heart? That is the question. The outer is a projection of atoms, whereas the inner is the domain of the spirit which includes the outer. Without the omnipotent spirit to power the mind there wouldn't be any atoms. It doesn't require too much intelligence then to sus out who's really running the show. It is the spirit and it is the spirit in and off the matter which determines all fates. This is life. All universes are mind made and the spirit makes the mind. This, to the aware gurus, is a fact. It is one of the initial realisations on the road to cosmic consciousness. It is a heightened awareness that everything exists as a common energy called consciousness. It is the mind that produces the pictures within consciousness. The pictures are projections and they are no more real than anything else that is on film. It is all, the most exquisitely brilliant holographics.

  Some years ago, not far from the opera house in Sydney, three beings who had experienced nervous breakdowns set up a place for other beings who had cracked up. They started off with an old dirty building and with hard labour they cleaned it up real good. They paid to have the gas and the power reconnected and they stocked the joint with the essentials of human living. Coffee, tea, food, a fridge, a decent dunny seat, a condom machine, several ash trays, furniture and a phone. They put the word out that the joint was operational and these days hundreds upon hundreds of people go there. The disturbed, the mixed up, the fucked up, the half crazy and the near suicidal find solace in the place because they are surrounded by characters who are going through the same experiences. They satsang there, so to speak. They surround themselves with noble, friendly company. They make meals together, they eat together and they share the innermost depths of their beings. They offer support to each other during the very frightening times of their own, individual, personal crisis.

  One fine spring day, a parcel arrived at the joint. It had come from the west and it was addressed to no one in particular. One of the social workers there opened it and found what appeared to be a not too bulky manuscript. On top of the script was a letter and the social worker pulled it out. She was extremely curious as to what was going on. She really did desire to be entirely tuned to the big picture. Who doesn't in these very accelerated times? Upon scrutinising the letter she discovered that it was from a being in the west who said that he had had a couple of crack ups in his life. He told that because crack ups gave him the absolute shits that he had become a seeker. A seeker of the self knowledge which would enable him to do away with all crack ups forever. In other words, he wanted to realise or become enlightened. He also related that he was severely addicted to writing fiction stories and that as he was searching he had written the story that was contained in the enclosed manuscript. He wrote bluntly that they could do what they liked with it. They could read it, they could use it for scrap paper or they could wipe their bums with it. He didn't care. He said that it might take a while for it to get rolling but that once it got rolling, it rocked. He asserted that he had had to deal with his spirit in order to get it out of his attached mind. He had had to deal in the sense that he could not claim it as his own, personal achievement. It was he claimed, the result of many spirit's work. He wished them all the best and then the letter ended. The social worker who read the letter passed the parcel on to a bloke called Adam who just happened to be walking by at the time. She explained to him what the deal was with the manuscript. Adam had a cup of coffee in one hand and an unlit fag in the other. He had been coming to the joint for about three weeks, after a friend had told him about it. It had been a good move for him and in the last week or so he had actually stopped thinking about suicide. He really liked hanging out with others who were also really messed up and who had thought a lot about suicide. He didn't feel so alone anymore and he now considered that he had friends in what was obviously an alien and hostile world.

  Adam liked to read so he took the manuscript to his favourite seat. He looked at the cover letter and laughed at the part where the writer had said that they could wipe their bums with it. He decided to keep that in mind. He also noted that the writer considered that once the story got going, that it rocked. This didn't surprise him because many books that he'd read followed this format. He lit his fag, sucked in and blew out a cloud of smoke. By the time that he'd taken the third drag on the cigarette it tasted like shit. Adam wondered why he was bothering with the damn thing. He made a mental note to himself that as soon as his nerves were better that he was going to give the horrible things up. A red headed friend, Max, appeared at his elbow and enquired what he was doing. Adam showed him the cover letter. Max read it, scratched his red beard, grunted and then handed it back. He took off to get a coffee as Adam started to investigate the raw papers on his lap.

 

 

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  "Shit! Shit! Shit!," roared a red faced Carol when she saw the title to the story that Adam was going to read and which she was going to have to read too.

  "Shit! Why me? Why me?," she yelled again at the ceiling. "Fuck you Helen!"

 

 

 

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EPSILON, THE GURU AND COSMIC CONSCIOUSNESS

 

 

 

                                                                                    

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                   


DATA FOR SOULS

 

All souls are ONE

Many, many souls inhabit the physical worlds.

Some souls inhabit the subtle, astral worlds.

A few souls inhabit the mental, causal worlds.

The odd soul realises cosmic consciousness.

They are the ONE.

                                 

                                  

 

 

  Karma kills, quite often with a horrible death rattle. Over and over again, karma kills. That's the deadset truth. Let imagination go and when it gets caught inbetween desire and fear it will utilise the soul's memory body and spin out holographic or projected picture world karma like a spider's web. In this universe or any other, what you put out is most definitely what you'll get back. Whatever it is that is light or dark that you're fascinated with, you are going to get more of it, for sure. What you plant in consciousness or beyond, so you shall reap, life after life. It'll come back in multiple measures too, more for less. A sign of the mysterious Maker's love and desire to please and support by reinforcing the reality that you are proclaiming, often mistaken in third dimensional holograms (physical worlds) as indicating the absence of any divine power. Because handling karma can be pure hell which tests your faith in love to it's most extreme limits. That's the testing, evolutionary way the entire sentient existence thing works. Every created soul, the mysterious Maker has proclaimed throughout creation, is a spirit class heroine or hero who will eventually via ascension of consciousness, escape the wheel of karma. Liberation from that which binds the spirit when it dons the flesh is everyone's dream and everyone's eventual destiny too. Divinity cannot be achieved or learnt, though it can be remembered as the natural state of the soul. Illusion, which is the skin of existence, must be peeled off to reach the sumptuous fruit within. To stop a rotten, projected dream, you merely wake up. You don't have to shoot or bomb anyone.

To put in the evolutionary, contemplative, meditative effort on the I am, I exist, I love then is to be elevated beyond consciousness into orgasmic playgrounds where that which is beingness and non beingness is able to enjoy the everlasting, harmonious delights of the incredibly divine, incredibly REAL existence. Without any kind of self burdened suffering in a soul projected, dense or subtle body too. That is the divine plan, that each and every created soul ascends this fantastic ladder, eventually. Your essence is enough to do this, your prescience is enough to do it. Why? Because you already are IT, the truth. Let go of the false and the unreal, the illusions, the I am this or that dream and the game is over. Or rather, it really begins. You are a player within the big picture of infinite mysterious Maker power dwelling within you and via illusion, through the mind, without too. Your power to love unconditionally is a treasure of infinite wealth because to love without any need of return is the Tao. It is in fact, the only Tao. Then, forever liberated, you will dance as an equal with the mysterious Maker in fields of light that defy imagination. You will be home in the ONE and only REAL world. The world beyond the I Am. The Source, the Supreme Reality, the dwelling place of the Supreme Soul. You will have realised that you are the Limitless Being. This is your destiny because it is who you really are. Just as a tiny wave is also the mighty ocean, so whatever body you appear to be in are you always the Supreme Soul.

 

  The soul, from the spirit world angle and the terrestrial ones too, is the accumulated experiences of a spirit throughout time, space and dimension. The spirit is that energy force provided for you by the mysterious Maker which makes you go. It is your electricity source, the gift of quickened life. It powers and provides the focal point to be an individuated existence in any universe. It takes you in and out of holograms, providing the appropriate body ship for the appropriate experience. It winds its way in and out of your soul like the holographic yeast in holographic bread, spirit does. Revere it as the Maker within you. Let it guide you home to the hidden ocean of bliss which the Maker has provided for you behind the curtain of karmic illusions. Live for that moment when you openly declare that your almighty spirit and the Maker are one again. For that is your birthright, to proclaim that. Never forget that it is the destiny of your soul to be free of any limitation whatsoever. To free yourself desire nothing, for you already have and are everything. Be fearlessness itself for in the true reality nothing created can hurt, harm or kill your soul. The unreal never really lives, except through projected pictures. The Real, having never been born, can never die. To discover that which you really are, first determine what you are not and call that the unreal. Any body, thought, feeling or thing that is transient is false. It is mind projected dream. Only the immutable is Real. The mutable false is the nexus and plexus of illusion. If it can be perceived or conceived it cannot be your real Self. How can it if the perceiving or conceiving is sourcing from some other, dimensionless point? A freed soul who has realised the Self roams beyond  infinity with the mysterious Maker, equal in power and unbound by dimensional space or time or karma or body. A freed soul is a powerhouse of spiritual love and glory beyond measure. It is to become a freed soul endowed with cosmic consciousness that we do what we do. It is to spiritually love that we really exist for it is spiritual love that gives us real existence and sustains and perpetuates it. All power emanates from divine spirit love and all power returns to IT. This is the one and only law of the ONE.

                                                                  

                        

                                                                  *

  ( EXANE FROM THE OTHER SIDE CALLING.........FOR A CHAT.)

  Now how many fucking times had I heard all of that!? I ask and I share that I have lost count. I lost count a long, long time ago. Over and over again the guides drummed that what was considered to be essential data into us. Then they reinforced continually that what we were all chasing as souls was the highest skill, being able to love unconditionally. Exactly like our super benevolent, mysterious Maker. Now I didn't doubt any of that anymore and I loved the Boss as much as the next soul dude. The thing was though that we were in astral class and I was, I must admit, a bit bored. We'd been going over some of our past lives again and I'd been over them so many times that I knew implicitly where the chronic mistakes were. I already had plans to attempt to erase the very last of some payback karma from these lives in a future life in the Earth hologram. Frankly, I couldn't understand why Angelica ( a guide who was temporarily supervising our pod) was insisting that I view the mistakes again. Kenneth, our usual guide was away on celestial business and I was sure that he would have allowed me to plot and plan rather than review.

To my way of thinking Angelica was being too strict. I had trouble handling the strict types, I was that sort of a soul. It didn't matter where I was either, externally enforced authority bugged me. Earth or astral, I had difficulty accepting that stuff. The dominator types tended to rub up against my essence a lot more succinctly than easy going beings. They taught me a lot though. They taught me that one has to love, no matter what. It's the only choice really because if you hate it will blow the excreta out of you, one way or another. Then the love which is the real you but which has been buried ever so deep, perhaps for many lifetimes, will come out. Hate, envy, jealousy and so forth cause endless karmic trouble whilst love of all that is bursts that psychological bubble that is holding your soul's psyche back, that's true. It has taken me many trips to Earth to sort all of that stuff out though. It was not a quick graduation to that point of view where I accepted love of all, love of the one as the only truthful, soul tribe reality, I can assure you. I've been bad to the bone quite a few times in both female and male bodies and if you want to know a secret, so has everyone else in my class. Including the guide.

  My Earth trips are also not finished because like every other soul bod around this joint, I am still on the wheel of karma. Like every other soul bod around the joint though, I am doing what I can to get off the payback treadmill. Truthfully, there's nothing else to do here but to strive for that. To erase false, karma generated impressions and replace them with spiritually true ones, that's why we keep going. Because frankly, and every soul here knows this, the wheel of karma is a big drag on a spirit's enormous potential to experience pure bliss with the mysterious Maker. Especially so when balancing karma requires multiple field trips to crazy mad, dualistic matter worlds, like the Earth. Around here though, it is known that those who are now the highest and closest to the Maker started off slowly. It's just a fact, every soul is slow out of the blocks. Does a baby of 6 months lecture on the connections between metaphysics and physics? Of course not, quite the contrary happens.

New spark souls, like their human baby counterparts, sleep a lot. It's a way of adjusting to the awesome power inherent in the universe. It's a peek-a-boo affair with the mysterious Maker of the divine creation. Until your heart chakra is really warmed up and you're ready to get up off your spiritual knees, how do you deal with the fact that you have been created to live eternally by an incomprehensible, omnipotent entity like the one and only Maker? Some sleep astrally, snoozing in their podcones, others dive into illusory worlds. They kill two birds with one stone then. They get away from the awesomely subtle powers of the etheric Maker and they get some practical experience at loving in a physical body ship. The bodyship is total illusion though for raw, young souls, an illusory bodyship is better than no bodyship at all. A bodyship may appear to be awesomely real blood and bone but the absolute truth is that it is nought but a holographic picture projected through divine light onto a mindscreen. Take it from me who has apparently died 1000's of times now. Immediately after death you will realise that you never were a body and the chances favour that you will be mightily relieved about that. Chaotics who have had shockingly frightful lives and deaths are different. They don't always wish for continuance, though after a while they settle down and get on with their astral work. They have no choice really because a soul cannot die. It's absolutely impossible. Many have tried, not one has ever succeeded. The mysterious Maker will grant sleep and rest, but never death. Energy can be transformed, it cannot be annihilated. This is a spiritual fact.

  On Earth, many full growns with their eyes wide open and their mouths relentlessly flapping are very much asleep to their spirits and souls. They are totally convinced that what is happening to them is real and they have many fears in their cells about death and existence. Many of them have absolutely no idea that they are in a holographic, mind matrix. Some are leaders, many are followers, others are ingrown pessimists and are heavily inclined to cynicism. Most look out for success, very few look in and even less seek openly the cosmic consciousness which is their spirit's goal. It is a deliberate side effect of their going there that they forget their noble and divine origins. You can't reincarnate or re birth another mind projection without experiencing almost total amnesia to your past efforts and your existence in the very real spirit worlds. Souls do this hardness so that they can play the game of awakening. Remembering who you really are as spirit and the spiritual love that bore you forth and sustains your etherealness in a dualistic nuthouse like the Earth is a comprehensively awesome experience. Frightening, yet at the same time, excruciatingly exhilarating. A real soul rush. Characters who go super deeply through this are changed forever. They quickly ascend to the ranks of the Yellows. Some of them even go right through the Yellow packs into those of the Blues. Some of them even go higher and the odd one goes straight to the mysterious Maker's dimension, or reality level.

These are the truly, extraordinarily gifted souls, the Jesus and Buddha types. To be in their presence is to experience a close encounter of the most magically uplifting kind. To touch them is to touch the mysterious Maker for they are Maker energy in its most highest expression. Long, long ago have they shed their egos. Long, long ago have they transcended all illusions and returned to Source. To the Ocean of bliss that awaits us all. They are within themselves, a universe of light. As we all are. The difference is that they are totally aware of it and live it for real. They have super graduated and have gone straight to the top of the cosmic class. The rest of the mob, including all of us, are still stuffing around with cock and bull illusions. See for yourself after your next death if that isn't the absolute truth of it. Or ask, what would be the point in telling a lie at such an early stage in the Epsilon story? We are just in the insight business. We're not trying to con anyone or start off another new age religion. Insights are not just ideas, they're our spiritual food. They go far deeper into the psyche than false ideas and they tremendously alter the dimensional range of one's picture of reality. This is the path to cosmic consciousness. We let insights out when we've got them and we lap them up when they're offered to us. That's all that we know. At present.

  I shuffled my light body around some and tried to focus on the holographic pictures on the desk in front of me. They were showing a couple of rather violent 18th century lives that I'd had in western Europe. I had killed numerous people and committed several rapes. I had consequently been removed from my pod. I was in fact, not allowed to go home. I was ostracised. It was a monumentally incredible shock to my system, I cannot emphasise that enough. Words, as beautiful as they can be, are just symbols. They are not fit for explaining the real nor do they do the freaky territory of separation from one's loved ones justice. I do not wish to speak about where they took me either, although I will state that it took me several extremely hard lives to pay back the karma for my dirty deeds. I also had to do half of these before I was allowed to rejoin my eternal buddies in our pod or group. In Earth terms, we are now 16 to 17 year olds, so we're quite young really. Was it ever a great moment then when I was allowed to work with my allies again! Was it ever a blessed relief to be in the presence of their hospitable, loving essences once more. What a bunch of characters! My gang, my eternal soul mates. I love them with a love that stretches to infinity and back. I adore them as I adore the mysterious Maker who gave us the games to play in and each other to play with. Long live Boss Maker!

  I was a bit behind for a while after those bad guy lives, though I soon caught up. A couple of very close pod allies to me even did a couple of shitty lives to help me out. Nothing heavy though, they weren't killers. They were basically just loud mouthed aggressives who totally ignored the feelings and sensitivities of others. Bigots, dominance freaks, hypocrites, that sort of thing. Near the end of these lives they all got shafted by their own ignorance, as such types invariably do. I still owe them some for absorbing some of my stuff though. All of our karmas are so intertwined though that we can swap and bargain virtually as we please. I'll deliver sooner or later, it is written. In fact, as I mentioned, I'm hoping to clean most of it up in my next sojourn in the Earth hologram. I was extremely lucky too because it took considerable persuasion back then before the guides would allow us to implement our little plan, which has now lead to our next big plan venture which we call Epsilon.

Borrowing karma is a tricky business. The powers that be always go over such traded intentions with excruciating caution. No doubt they will be of the same group mind when we feed them the totality of Epsilon. So far we've only given them bits and pieces because that's all that we've had to give. Earlier on though, before class, we figured it all out. Or we got the general gist of it. That's why I'm so keen to get off reviewing and onto planning. Only masters go to Earth with a giant smile, the rest of us just grit our teeth and hope to hell that things will go basically according to a rudimentary plan, so to speak. I haven't been so excited about a forthcoming life for a long time though. Even though the odds of completing our holy mission are in the millions, I actually feel optimistic. It's that good old group feeling that is driving us on. It's the possibility of doing great service for the mysterious Maker that is making us feel enigmatic. If we wake up to the fact that we are the spirit light whilst we're in the Earth hologram, well that would be a bonus. 

  "Exane!," Angelica suddenly hailed me telepathically.

  I attuned to her and allowed her into the astral mind to which I was attached. She was feeling me out and I could hide nothing from her.

  "Yes ma'am?," I replied as politely as I could.

I wouldn't want to give any mortal readers here the wrong impression regarding my perceptions of this guide. I in no way disliked her nor did I feel the slightest bit of animosity towards the essence of her beingness. In the spirit world certain emotional states are considerably calmed down. You don't normally get that runaway effect that so often characterises physical embodiment. It is also possible here to feel intensely the soothing love vibrations of the Boss energy. Souls around this airy joint know implicitly that they were born to love all. Angelica has considerable power in that area and she's quite a bit more advanced than either myself or anyone in my pod. This is evident by her auric colour, she being a sparkling yellow and the rest of us being not to bright whites. I respected her tremendously even though I felt currently that she was deliberately giving me a hard time. The others were telepathically ribbing me about it too. I could hear them laughing and chatting away about it at the back of my astral mind. Shorty was calling me gung ho again and I was calling him sodbuster back. The reference to sodbuster being because for his past three lives he has incarnated as an asparagus farmer. Why, only Shorty, a couple of the guides and the Maker know. The rest of us have toyed with the idea that he has a real fondness for the same geographical area where he incarnates. I think that there's more to it though. Knowing Shorty, he'll have an ulterior motive or two for going there and doing that in his de karma basket. He's just that sort of soul.

  "Why do you love the Maker Exane?," Angelica asked me.

What a question! Of all the questions in the universe, she has to go and ask me that. I could hear the others chuckling away because they knew that the guide had me in a bind. Shorty was practically roaring his head off. He could feel my wheels working overtime and to him that was a great joke.

  "Now now class!," the guide telepathed.

  "Simmer down! Shorty, if you can't keep it together you'd best go for a float around the park."

  "Yes ma'am!," Shorty replied as he cooled it. I felt his thoughts receding, like a retreating wave.

It was my turn to snigger now, though not for long. Angelica came towards me and as she vibrated she morphed into a male face, one of many from her many incarnations. She looked like an elderly sea captain. We can all do this. We can manifest any face from any of our lives and project it onto the mental fields of others. Mostly we do this for recognition, sometimes we do it just for fun.

  "That's a very broad question sir," I said innocently to the morphed guide.

  "It is the only question Exane and it's time to give it your best shot," he replied.

I nodded and leant back into my holographic chair to think about it. That was my big mistake, I killed my spontaneity when I shouldn't have. Angelica and the class waited patiently for my pearls of wisdom. They all knew that I was going to stuff up because I'd killed my spontaneity. I knew in a couple of moments that they knew too, I just absorbed the essence of their emanations. The law of the class though said that I had to answer the question, even if it was almost unanswerable. In the end I just telepathed that if it wasn't for the Maker then I wouldn't be here, they wouldn't be here and there would be no entertainment. There would, in effect, be nothing. Not even a vast, dark void.

  The way it came out though it sounded as though I was saying that I had to love the Maker because the Maker had done all of this incredible holographic stuff which kept all of us created entities entertained. Angelica, who had now morphed back into the usual way that she portrayed herself, was into me like a shot. I knew that she would be and I knew that she'd set me up. However, there was muck all that I could do about it. I was in it and that was all that there was to it. I was that sort of a soul, I was always in it. Earth or astral, trouble followed me around like a slave. This situation had something to do with the picture of reality that I broadcast to the universe and that was what I wanted to work on in my next Earth life. It is worth mentioning that the self image a soul has whilst they are doing Earth (or any of the other holographic worlds) crosses over to this side with them when they die. Others, some from my pod and some from other pods, were going to work on their pictures of reality with me. The only consolation that I had regarding my troubled existence was that when I looked around I knew that I wasn't alone. I knew that my sisters and brothers and cousins were in and out of the karmic poo just as much as I was. At the back of my attached mind then I could sense the faint hysterics of my fellow class members. They were highly amused and highly relieved that they weren't the sucker who had been asked such an incredible, fathomless question. Some of them, I detected telepathically, even anticipated that they would have needed a long list to answer properly. Something like thank you for the ability to go wee wee in the physical, thank you for mummy and daddy, thank you for the blue sky, thank you for my physical, astral and causal bodies, thank you for my power to love, thank you for all of creation and my astral homeland and buddies here, thank you for the macrocosm and the microcosm, thank you for eternal life and so forth. That sort of thing. The list is endless really.

  "So you love the Maker because of creation then Exane, do you? You love creation first and creator second?," the guide asked me. "You live solely for the mateship and entertainment then, do you?"

  "That's not really what I meant Angelica!," I fired back. I hate to say this but Angelica was really starting to piss me off.

  "Oh! Well what did you mean then?," she retorted. "Perhaps you meant that you love the maker simply because the Maker is?"

  "That's exactly what I meant Angelica!," I ejaculated, seizing her cue. I love the Maker because the Maker is, that sounded beautiful. That sounded right. I couldn't top that. No way.

  "You took the words right out of my soul!," I exclaimed with happiness rebounding within my light form. It was good to be off the hook. It had all happened so easily too. I must admit, every now and again something went my way and it felt so good. Let's face it, karma is bi.

  It was lovely of Angelica to throw me that lifeline. I felt buoyed as she touched me with her yellow warmth. I could feel her heightened intelligence rippling through my luminous, whispy form. I could feel her love and I reciprocated in my own way. The guides really are special people, they do first class work. They leave the more subtle, colourful, lighter areas where they dwell and where we can't go to yet and they come here and guru around with slobs like us. They give us insights of immense proportions, free of charge too. They want us to be as aware as them and they aspire to be as aware as the Blues ahead of them and the Blues aspire to be as aware as the Purples and on and on it goes forever. All of the way to the Maker's front doorbell, the ascension path continues. Those above continually feed us insights so that we might grow rapidly to their level of consciousness awareness.

The usual reality though is that progress is dreadfully slow. It's mucking pitiful really. We're fine and dandy here in our astral homeland. Once we hit the training holograms though, it's a completely different story. Especially the Earth one. Around here the Earth one has a reputation as being mega difficult. Without a doubt, it's the hardest of the lot. There are worlds where souls can go and float around in blob like forms in splendid oceans. After doing Earth, some souls elect to go to such places to unwind and relax. Who can blame them? The Terran sphere is the one where you can get the most rapid, evolutionary marks though and that's why we all do it so much. It's a real curly, unbelievably tough hologram yet we do it because we want to get ahead in the spiritualising of self business quickly, if we at all can. I've seen dudes come back from Earth though and they've been thoroughly fried, to the exceedingly well done stage too. Often they're burnt to a crisp. Many of us have to have long, cool, astral showers after our Earth lives. These showers are like coloured, highly charged vibrations that cleanse our astral forms of the tensions of our recently released physical bodies. Then we have a chat with our guide or guides to sort out where we succeeded or stuffed up and what we'll have to work on in our next life. The guides are the light beings that so many NDE's on Earth see at the end of the departure tunnel. After that we travel the electric and magnetic tracks of the astral to our home pods, usually to announce happily that another glorious death is over and done with, thank Christ. Then we party, again. It doesn't matter who's in or who's out, when a fellow soul returns home, we party. We have been celebrating death for what seems like an eternity, so there is no reason not to party. Apart from that, we aim for that beyond where we will know the only truthful reality. That is that as the Source that endlessly projects innumerable universes and forms, we have never been born, nor have we ever died. At the level where we are all ONE, that is a deadset fact. Experiencing it as reality though, that is another, much more volatile question. The void is not for the faint hearted, only pure realists can go there. Only the deserving receive the ultimate dessert of cosmic consciousness.

  "Exane?," Angelica hailed me again.

  "Yes ma'am?," I answered again.

  "Where are you this period?"

  "I'm in the 4th dimension ma'am!"

  "No Exane! I mean where are you in that mind that you're attached to? I can feel you plotting and planning away like a maniac when you're supposed to be studying those holographic lives to ascertain again why you became violent in them. Why am I sensing that you are transcribing a message to someone when you are supposed to be diligently doing your studies?"

  "It's Epsilon ma'am, I just can't get my mind off it."

  "Epsilon! You mean this crazy plan that you and Shorty and the others have to do Earth lives as astral whistleblowers?"

  "It's not crazy ma'am!"

  "Exane, it's a madly ambitious idea. You know the nature of that hologram and you know the odds of pulling something like that off are in the millions. Probably billions."

  "Even so ma'am, we'd still like to give it a go. We've worked for many lives towards our coming ones and we've been thinking about Epsilon for a long, long time."

  "How do you intend to whistleblow Exane? You know the appalling awareness level of most of so called humanity. Here is a species that refuses to question what is real and therefore lives in the unreal, denying the real force of immutable cosmic love as unbelievable fantasy. How are you going to get around that?"

  "Just before class, we decided that our data would have to be released through a book. In a book, we could maybe use fantasy to explain true reality," I telepathed eagerly.

  "Oh! You are going to suggest that they contemplate the I Am, witness their attached mind and identify with the absolute instead of the particular, are you?"

  "We're not sure what will be in the book yet ma'am. We haven't even decided if it will be fiction or non fiction."

  "Who is going to write this whistleblower of a book Exane?"

  "We don't know yet ma'am. Could be Shorty, could be me, could be one of the others. Could be a female or a male pushing the mouse, we're not sure yet."

  "It seems to me that this plan is still in it's very basic stages then. What does Kenneth think about it?," our guide asked me.

  "He only knows the basic idea that we want to go as whistleblowers. He doesn't know any of the structure as yet. He has said though that if we get the structure and are willing to organise it, then he'll submit it to the council," I informed her.

  "That's just the Yellow council though Exane! Such a proposition would have to go through both the Blue and Purple councils and even beyond."

  "We know ma'am. We'd still like a shot at it though. They may all pass it for implementation. It's basic idea is in accordance with changes that are already going on in the Earth hologram. There's a super release of spiritual data going on there at the moment. The gurus spread information there about here, why shouldn't we?"

  "They will not be looking at it from the point of view of you all not succeeding though. They would have to consider carefully the fluke factor, that you all actually might pull it off," Angelica asserted.

  "So ma'am, we gently wake a few people up. It's been done before and it'll be done again. It's no big deal."

  "So you say Exane! I can assure you though, that is not the way the Purples will look at such a proposal. The release of the right data at the right time within holograms is critical, as you all know. If the big picture is exposed before it is supposed to be exposed, it can lopside the whole works. I'm telling you all, they are going to weigh the risk factor of Epsilon on the finest scales available in the astral realm. Be prepared with a counterplan and if you want to be very wise, have a counterplan to that."

  "Ma'am!"

  "Yes Shorty?"

  "We've got to do something different sooner or later ma'am. The Earth hologram is just too hard! There's too much little self identification with the separated body mind stuff there and the resulting emotions are killers. The last time that I was there it freaked the absolute shit out of me. I crapped my pants voluminously because I thought that I was a separate thing that the universe had spat out, or shat out. Crikey! I really thought that I was going to die and that that was going to be the end of me."

  "Me too!," I ejaculated, along with several others.

  "The fear there was unbelievable!," Shorty added.

  "It sure was!," I telepathed, along with several others.

  "Holograms are supposed to be fun places offering the opportunity for spiritual advancement, not fucken horror rides!," Shorty continued.

  "That's enough Shorty!," our guide said.

  "I get the picture. I remind you all though that the Earth hologram is deliberately designed to be tough. If you can find your true self there, you can find it anywhere and everywhere, in this universe or any of the others."

  "We don't mind being hellbusters ma'am!," Shorty exploded.

  "Others are already cleaning that hell hole up, so we might as well add our bit, if we can. To tell the truth Ms Angelica, I'm just sick to death of suffering like a sick dog every time that I go there. I'd give anything for a slice or two of some decent, fun filled action there. Even if we assist in waking up only one other soul, at least we will have done something."

  "Your sentiments are very noble Shorty. Who amongst your Epsilon group though has book writing experience? I know that it's not you because you've been a farmer for the last 250 Earth years."

  "I wrote a poem or two the last time that I was there!," I told her.

  "That's hardly the credentials for computerising a whistleblowing story Exane."

  "It's a start though ma'am! We plan to have an around the illusory clock, insight team stationed with whomever is elected or volunteers to do the book anyway. The team members will be continually feeding the sucker...er, I mean the writer insights via dreams, thoughts and intuitive inspirations. They'll place in their path spiritual books, tapes, videos, mags, films and so forth."

  "You'll drive the scribe mad Exane! Their brains will fuse with the overdose of subtle data," our guide exclaimed.

  "Maybe, maybe not," I countered.

  "A mad writer will be better for our plan than no writer at all ma'am," Shorty argued.

  "As a matter of fact, a mad writer is probably, exactly what we need. They would be the perfect agent to carry out Epsilon. Their idiosyncratic madness will push them to follow spirit instead of personality."

  It was at this point that the orange light for the end of class started flashing. Souls began to shuffle, there was movement at the astral station.

  "Before you go, I have some interesting news," telepathed Angelica.

  "Guru Ritponnawannatta Ji will be floating around the park shortly. If you wish to commune with him, be there."

This was great news. The guru Ji was one of our favourites. A powerfully warm and friendly upper Blue who was always more than willing to share his innermost secrets. Everynow and again he dropped in for a chat and we always made the most of it. The vibes that the Master Ji kinds put out are phenomenal drawcards for our types. We are like moths to the flame. I was making telepathic arrangements with Shorty and some ot the others about visiting the park to seek out the master when Angelica asked for all Epsilon members to stay back. Those of us involved did so. We soon found ourselves floating in front of her and we were somewhat bemused. What did she want? The master was going to be in the park and we simply had to go and talk to the dude about our dog like mentalities. The hold up was a tad irksome. None of us wanted to miss the start, middle or end of the show.

  "Now souls," our guide telepathed.

  "I've had a wee look at your respective karma charts and I think that there's quite a bit of backlogged stuff that you ought consider incorporating into this Epsilon, if you're ever given the go ahead to do it. Exane..."

  "Yes ma'am!"

  "There's this frog business that you have to sort out."

  "Frog business! What frog business?," Shorty enquired.

  "Watch," Angelica replied.

We did. The hologram showed an episode from one of my previous lives. I was 15 and in an attempt to kill a large frog, I dropped it into a dish of hydrochloric acid. The acid only covered the bottom half of the frog and so the poor creature kind of sizzled in the gruesome bath. The others watched, oblivious to the reasons of my cruel actions.

  "What were your motives there Exane?," the guide asked me.

I had to travel down a few mental pathways to access the answer for her, though eventually the memories came.

  "One of my girlfriends wanted a frog to cut up in her biology class ma'am. I didn't know how to kill it and stupidly, I did that. The frog was buggered too. It wouldn't hold together after its bath, so I couldn't give it to her anyway."

  "Well, you'll need to rectify in it your next life Exane. It's been on your chart too long. Killing must be paid back as soon as possible, you know? Next time buy your girlfriend a friendship ring and help every frog in need of help."

  "Yes ma'am!"

  "Hitler!," Shorty quipped.

  "Now Shorty," said our guide.

  "Yes ma'am?"

  "Watch this and you'll find out who the real Hitler is."

  Another hologram appeared. It showed Shorty in one of his previous lives. He too was about 15. He was in the back yard of a suburban house. He had a sharpened shovel and a sack and had dug a small hole in the dirt. Into the hole, from out of the sack, he tipped 6 small, new born kittens. They didn't even have their eyes open. Shorty then took the sharpened shovel and brutally chopped the cats up. We were all mortified. Shorty was such a peaceful soul really. Shorty though didn't flinch. Not one section of his S'ish shaped light form was out of place. He calmly answered Angelica when she requested his motives in performing such an action. Shorty told that his dad had asked him to drown the kittens because the family hadn't the food to feed them. Their yard was already full of cats, dogs and chooks and they were quite poor. He explained that he thought it would have been a quicker death for them to be chopped up. He was trying to do them a favour, though he too admitted to being stupidly ignorant. As well, Angelica forced him to admit that he had enjoyed himself tremendously. It's almost impossible to lie to a guide and as on Earth, in the long run it's the liar who suffers the most. By far.

  Shorty was told to look after all of the cats who crossed his path next time around, then Angelica turned her attention to Lu Mi, or Jill as we sometimes called this soul. Another hologram appeared on Angelica's desk and we all got to watch one of the best porno shows that I've ever seen. It was absolutely wild, talk about ribald. Lu Mi certainly knew how to spread it around whenever she did the Earth. By the time that the guide had finished with her though, it was clear that Lu Mi would have to choose her next Earth trip very carefully if she wanted to get over the sexual karma thing. This wasn't news to any of us because we were all in the same boat with every life that we picked. Dealing with groin energies in the Earth hologram drove nearly everyone insane. It's one of the many great joys of returning home that one can forget about that shit, until the next time. Sex is energy, that's all. It's just an acquired habit that makes slaves out of spiritual beings. Love as the omnipotent energy, like the universe delivers it, that is the key habit and the only one worth chasing around.

Angelica then dealt with the two last remaining members of our Epsilonian group, Jack and Wendy, although most of the time it is difficult to tell who is who. Jack and Wendy are what is known here as swappers. They are two distinct souls who have melded their energies together in an attempt to speed their progress. They do multiple lives together all of the time and quite often they go as twins. We can all do multiple lives though and spread our essences over different holograms, or different time periods in the same hologram. Jack and Wendy though are specialists at it and Shorty and I had spent many astral moons persuading them to become Epsilonians. We figured that there skills would come in mighty handy in some way or another in our whistleblowing plans and we still figure that we've figured rightly. Luckily Angelica had picked them up on a trifle. They had recently been as a heterosexual couple and violently argued too much. Now they had to go as homosexuals and be nice to each other. Our mighty Epsilon plans could accommodate that.

  Well, mirthy bunch that we were, we took our light forms via the agency of next to near pure thought to the park. The park was a replica of one in the Earth hologram, only it was much more beautiful. The astral world is like that. The colours here are much cleaner, clearer, sharper, brighter and they are exceedingly mystical. Everything has a crystal like sparkle to it. There are scenarios available to us that are beyond belief. We are also gifted with the ability to adjust or maybe even improve certain aspects of these scenarios and if that is what one is into, it can be a lot of fun. That was not our mission of the moment though. We were after a chat with the guru Ji and we were not alone. For, when we located this powerhouse of an entity, we discovered him in the centre of a huge crowd.

  "Holy shit!," Shorty exclaimed.

  "Every mother's child and their dog is here!"

Not to be dismayed, we mingled with our fellow souls and leant our ears to what this great guru was saying. He was talking about developing the skills of being able to recognise the illusurory nature of a hologram when one is immersed in a hologram. He had not been telepathing long so we hadn't missed much. We listened attentively as he spoke about critical factors. Namely that identifying with being a separate name and shape or body and mind binds one ruthlessly to the hologram. To the extent that the holographic movie is perceived as being real, when in fact the whole lot of it is nothing more than the mental projections or fluid energy of the grosser aspects of an attached mind. The ego mind then starts running around going I am this, I am that, I want this, I want that, I fear this, I like this, I don't like that, I love this, I hate that and consequently a whole lot of dualistic joy and sorrow and other shit results. Pain follows short lived pleasure and short lived pleasure follows pain and on and on it goes spreading suffering galore. The fulfilment of a desire or desires creates more desires and the web of illusion tightens. It really is a nasty, vicious circle and the overhelmed by maya (or material illusion) majority get hopelessly caught in its trap. The devilish lower desires spin out endless illusions. Only death cuts the threadlike chains to them.

  "Whenever you are doing a training hologram you must strive to go beyond the mind via mind witnessing and meditation so that you perceive and identify with the absolute limitlessness of the shoreless ocean instead of the limited nature of the particular wave," the guru Ji stated.

  "Easier said than done!," someone in the crowd called out. "Solidity is an overwhelmingly powerful illusion! The senses are almost impossible to ignore when it comes to food, sex and the insatiable desires of the ego for fame and fortune!"

  There was a huge mumble of assent because everyone in the crowd knew that for the vast majority, breaking through the matrix spun by fear and desire and pain and pleasure whilst play acting in imaginary solid worlds was, to say the least, exceedingly difficult. This was essentially the crux of the problem because the perception of the hardness or the impossibility of liberation lead to hardness of the psyche which lead to the follow up perception that there was no escape from human angst. That is, the life was definitely not meant to be easy philosophy. Thus the mad search for pleasure from illusory material things is continually reinforced and consciousness remains at an exceedingly dense, exceedingly ignorant level. Contrastingly, if the perception is developed that salvation is certainly possible because of the nature of spirit to take over from personality the moment it is given the chance to do so, then all else will follow without effort. The door back into the light is always open and there is absolutely no need to shed the body to stroll back through it. It also follows that the door out is also the door in and that what happens is that the lower self identifies with the mind's movie like projections and cuts itself off from the spirit Self. The Earth then is a shadow dreaming world where only a select few realise their full potential by attaining cosmic consciousness. They do this by ignoring the illusory desires of the material senses and shifting power back to the spirit Self, where it belongs. Deep meditation and a humble, frugal lifestyle are essential prerequisites for this course.

  "If you limit yourself here, you will limit yourself there!," guru Ji answered the naughty heckler.

  "Therefore, begin here. Recognise that in essence you are all the Self that is timeless, spaceless, causeless, birthless, deathless and the source of everything known and unknown."

The guru spoke about some other stuff for quite a while and then we got a mighty surprise. Master Ji requested a private audience with our Epsilon group. We had no idea how he knew about it, though with the guru types one soon learns not to worry about how they come by their information. They just do. Most of the audience didn't have a clue what Epsilon was and pretty soon they were shuffling off. Their light forms disappeared into the distance as they returned to their pods. There were however, a few hangers on.

  "Piss off!," Shorty told them jokingly.

  "We'll fill you in later, maybe. This is our scene, so cut loose y'fuckers!"

  They did so and at the master's request we joined him in a float around one of the park's lakes. We were all pumped with the guru's grace. The love and admiration that we had for his eminence was like the purest honey. Our little light bodies were sparkling like dewdrops under an early morning sun. A bit of chit chat went on until we reached a rather isolated section of the astral park. Here we stopped and with incredible scrutiny the master checked out that we were really alone. He even investigated the astral air for invisible spirits. Satisfied that there were none about, he put it to us to elaborate on our plan to do some whistleblowing in the Earth hell hole. Well we blurted out what we had so far and the master took it all in. He smiled and then when quiet for a while. At this point I couldn't help wondering  why he was taking such an interest in our little project Epsilon. The others were of the same mind and for a while there were telepathic thoughts going everywhere. Shorty was also throwing out numerous faces simultaneously from his past lives and acting the goat as usual. Some of the expressions on his faces were unbelievably rude and extremely amusing.

  "Cool down!," the Ji instructed us.

  "I'm going to tell you something now and for the time being I want you to keep it to yourselves. At the moment it's only a rumour, however, it could affect Epsilon immensely. After all, if you're going to whistleblow then you'll need to tell the truth and only the truth, won't you?"

  "Of course master!," we answered in unison. "The truth is what it's all about. To find the truth and spread it is our holy mission."

  "Good enough! Then listen and listen carefully. The Purples were visited by a Silver recently."

  "Eh!," we all went. This was most interesting news because visits by Silvers were very rare. They only came when something of tremendous importance was going down. The last time they appeared was to inform those below them that the master soul Jesus was going to Earth.

  "The Silver told that they had been receiving telepathic communications from a Gold!"

  "A Gold!," we exploded. "Really!"

Now the Golds belonged to the unknown and no one in the entire astral kingdom from the Purples down had ever seen one.

  "Yes," said the Ji. "There's a Gold about the place somewhere and the sneaky fucker is up to something!"

 It is perhaps necessary here to mention the operations at the top of the consciousness hierarchy. Once a soul ascends to the ranks of the Purples, they are virtually on their own, so to speak. The ones above them do not visit and work with them like the Yellows and Blues above our types do. The Silvers will visit Purples on extremely rare occasions as mentioned. However, they do not hang around. Their considerably powerful insights can only be accessed through divine intuition or super advanced telepathy. It is the same with the Golds. Golds will visit Silvers but if they go into the other levels, they are always disguised. It is widely accepted that Golds are about as close to the mysterious Maker as a soul can get. Some even believe that there is only one of them and that that one is the Maker.

  "What's going on then master?," Shorty asked.

  "Is the universe going to blow up or something?"

The guru looked strained. I had never seen him like this. It was almost eerie.

  "The Gold told the Silvers something that is totally unbelievable Shorty. Mind you, it was more of the nature of an insight than a fact. So far, anyway."

  "Well what did they say master Ji?," we all blurted out as the curiosity overwhelmed us.

  "They told the Silvers to ponder the notion that perhaps, from that place where we are all ONE, that we made the Maker so that the Maker could make us as individuals."

  "What!," we exploded.

  "But that's heresy, isn't it?"

  "Maybe, maybe not. If it's the truth though, it means that we'll all have to have another long, hard look at our astral systems," the guru replied.

  "You can say that again!," ejaculated Shorty.

  "If it were true it would mean that even here, we're still in a training hologram. It would mean that God is not the ultimate. It would suggest that God is our servant and not the other way around."

  "What can we do master?," Lu Mi asked.

  "How can we help in this matter?"

The guru looked thoughtful for a moment.

  "You and Shorty are pairing off for Epsilon, are you Lu Mi?," he enquired.

  "For a time master,' she answered him.

  "Wendy and Jack, you are doing your usual, I suppose."

  "Yes master Ji, except that we'll be homosexual this trip," they informed him.

  "Good enough. What about you Exane? I gather that you'll want to rut around a bit before Epsilon gets into full swing."

  "Yes sir. I'm hoping that Becky from the pod next door to us will partner with me again, for a time," I replied.

  "Ok! I want you and Shorty to arrange things so that you travel to Bombay, India. I'll work with your astral insight team and direct you to a guru who will be there. He will not be well known so you will have to take care not to miss the cues."

  "What are we supposed to do when we find this guru?," Shorty asked.

  "Just question him. I have a lingering suspicion that the fellow might know something of what this Gold is on about. Once you're dead again, report straight to me. I'll meet you at the gate anyway."

  "Whatever data we obtain from this guru, are we free to use it in Epsilon?," I asked.

  "Yes! Of course. That's the whole point of the exercise Exane," guru Ji informed me.

I nodded obediently. There was nothing else that I could do and there was nothing else that I wanted to do. I loved the Ji and I trusted him like I trusted my own sweet soul and the sweet souls of those allied to me. When we left the park we were all potently aware that things were hotting up.

 

                                                                      *

 

    When the Epsilon group left the master after numerous other stuff had been discussed, the master sat alone. For some time he stared at the astral lake and the holographic creatures that inhabited it. His fiery blue aura seemed to radiate for miles. His soul, calmer than the calmest sea, was an ocean of blissful peace. He was congratulating himself on his little act. As usual, everything had gone perfectly and the will of the universes had been done. Then, without warning he appeared to go through some sort of mutation. His colours started changing into the most beautiful golden hues that any being could ever wish to see. There was a stupendous roar of divine laughter and then he vanished into the astral air and returned to his natural home, the great void. On the outskirts of the park, many beings saw what looked like a cosmic fireworks display. They asked each other what was going on, though none could explain the phenomenon.

 

                                                                        *

 

 

  "No!," said Becky, rather emphatically.

  "We've been through this before Exane and I'm not getting into it again. This Epsilon business is nuts! If you just want a casual rut for a few years then ask someone else to partner you."

  "But I don't want someone else Beck! I want you."

  "Why?"

  "Because you've got the experience love! Because we've worked together before."

  "Big deal Exane! We meet, we fuck, we marry and have kids, we fuck some more, then we start fighting and then we split. What's so great about that? Especially since we've done it three times already."

  "Awww! Come on Beck, just once more, please."

  "Well, what's in it for me Exane?"

  "Spoken like a true professional Becky!," said Shorty.

  "Stay out of this Shorty!," I told him.

  "Stay out of it!," he ejaculated. "I haven't even reincarnated yet and I'm already up to my eyeballs in karmic shit! How can you tell me to stay out of it? Frogs, cats, wives, kids and gurus are all on the agenda and our feet haven't even touched the holographic dirt yet. It's Epsilon's flying circus Exane, that's what it flipping is!"

  "Yeah! Yeah! Righto. Look Beck, how about this. You'll get a trip around the States in a kombi. You can sit on your arse the whole time and check out the scenery and I'll drive. We'll do Canada too. I'll do my best to make sure that you orgasm every time that we have it off as well. Later on you can have whatever property we amass, the kids, the car, the TV, the furniture, the dog, the computer, the video and half of m'soul. How about that?"

  "Well, I dunno Exane. After I get the property that we've amassed, the kids, the dog, the TV, the computer, the furniture, the car and almost everything else that I say I want, can I still bitch on about you? After all, I will have inherited a mountain full of child rearing work and it's going to cost me. Unlike you, I won't have the space or freedom to fart around writing spiritual fiction."

  "Ah so! You want to be the Supreme Reality, do you Beck?," roared Shorty.

  "Shorty! Cut it out. Sure Beck. Sure. You can bitch on till doomsday if you want," I told her. "After all,  you'll be body licensed to bitch that the world that you've created with your own attached mind is unjust."

  "Ok. I'll think about it then. I'll give you my answer tomorrow. Men do that too you know Exane? They create their worlds with their own attached minds and then whinge and whine about how much trouble everything is. Nearly everybody is ignorant down there, you know?"

  "Yeah! I know love. I know. I was just joking. You know that."

  We were in the arrangement tank, a holographic set up where we meet fellow souls who are planning forthcoming adventures participating in or assisting with the Earth training programme or those of other worlds.

  "Good stuff Becky!," I said as she floated off.

  "See you soon love."

I turned to Shorty who was smiling like the Mona Lisa. He knew that I could hardly wait until Becky had a holographic body again.

  "What a fantastic, fabulous soul," I told him. "She's real special."

  "We're all special Exane," quipped my old pal.

  "Yeah. I know. Look old bean! There's our insight crew. We'd better go and have a chat with them."

  We sauntered over to some great comrades of ours with whom we had made prior arrangements to inspire us when we were on the ground. They would get to us through dreams and those sudden flashes of intuitive inspiration that come through the human mind. When we are here we all have a great laugh about how the body mind of the physical vehicle totally forgets all of those wonderful spirit beings who are working with them through the subtle astral layers. No one on the Earth is ever alone although the feelings of abandonment and separation experienced there can be totally devastating. It is usually not until one is back in the light that these illusions are exposed. Then there is much laughter all around. Everybody has a good cackle at how dumb we get when we do the flesh. The One divides and projects the many. The One desires to know Itself. The many get themselves totally lost because they are drugged with the morbidity of the illusion that they are separate and alone. There is much pain, suffering and death. Or rather, there appears to be all of that. In reality, nothing happens, just like nothing happens in a dream. Later on, the many wake up and realise that they have only been dreaming and that in reality they are the One. It's not a bad game. It could've been worse. In the long run no one will doubt that the prize of individualised cosmic consciousness wasn't worth the price of experiencing apparent dualised illusions.

  "Ronald!," Shorty called out.

  "We've got some great news. Wait up y'fucker!"

We approached the group and exchanged greetings with all of them. Then we informed them that the guru Ji was going to be a part of their team to ensure that we met up with the Bombay guru. They were savagely astonished that Epsilon was going to have such a heavyweight involved in its proceedings.

  "How did you get him into it?," they asked with unbridled curiosity.

We told them the truth, that the master had invited himself in.

  "Crikey!," they all went.

  "With him in you're sure to get approval from the councils."

  "You betcha!," Shorty and I telepathed back.

  "We'd better sort out what's going down then. Have you established who's going to be the writer yet?," they asked.

  "It's outa me and Shorty," I told them.

  "None of the others are game. They'll rut and fuck around some but they won't write."

  "Well, that means it's got to be you Exane. Shorty couldn't write his way out of a bucket of shit!," Ronald remarked.

Shorty grunted, glad to be off the hook. All of a sudden I lost a bit of my enthusiasm for the plan. I couldn't back out now though, things had gone too far. With the master involved, we had to push ahead.

  "So, what's going to be in this book then Exane?," the crew asked me.

  "I haven't got a clue!," I barked back. "I'll write whatever you inspire me to write."

  "Oh piss off Exane! You tell us what messages you want us to send you and we'll send them. That was the deal."

  "No it wasn't. There hasn't been a deal yet!," I protested.

  "What about an espionage thriller!," ejaculated Shorty.

  "Secret document written by some priest or somebody that's full of cosmic information. All of the governments want to get a hold of it and put it under lock and key so that the people remain dumb to what's really going on."

There was a pause whilst everybody considered this plot.

  "Nahhh!," went Ronald. "That only works when it's a secret weapon that could kill a lot of people. Then they all want the document so that they can build the weapon so that when the time comes they can go ahead and use it. Then they know for a fact how many they can kill and what it costs to kill them."

Ronald was pretty smart. We gave that suggestion a miss. Besides, I had a lingering memory that something like that had been done before. Something about a prophecy or something. That was the absurdity of what we were attempting to do. It had all been said before in numerous places. The trouble was though that it only reached a tiny minority of interested body minds. The vast majority seemed only to be infatuated with ignorant rubbish that dulled the mind to the very real possibility of becoming an enlightened or realised being in one lifetime. Sometimes even, actors were paid millions to act like jerks or violent types who were good at dropping inane, dark one liners. Still, that was the people's business and whatever the fascination is the universe will just continue to produce more of it. On and on and on with the same mind masturbatory junk.

  "Well what about a cosmic romance?," roared Shorty.

  "Boy meets girl in the astral or something."

  "Nahhh!," we all went.

  "Boring!"

  "Well what about girl meets girl or boy meets boy in the astral? Maybe Wendy and Jack might reconsider and they could write the damn book together," my old mate suggested.

  "Still boring!," telepathed Ronald.

There was another pause and some solid thinking until Shorty sounded off again.

  "What about a divine comedy?," he asked.

  "Now you're getting warm," Ronald asserted. "Where's it set?"

  "America! There's a place where you can let all of the shit out and it will be eagerly and greedily lapped up. God bless America because they expose everything there! They're masters at it. They can make a soap opera out of absolutely anything."

  "Piss off Shorty! There's no way I'm going as a Yank. I want to write a whistleblower of a book, not get me fucken head blown off," I told him.

This went on for some time until we decided to sit on things. The crew took off to attend to some other business and Shorty and I went over to the screens to view possibles for our forthcoming lives. The screens are quite fantastic. They give souls the ability to look at the future in glimpses. One doesn't get the whole story, just enough to be able to select a solid vehicle that will enable karmic and other plans to be carried out. We can even go into the minds attached to characters that we select to see if they are suitable for the job. It wasn't long before we located a couple of personalities that showed considerable promise. They lived in the land of milk and honey called Australia and that suited the both of us no end. It would be a bonus for book writing to have a full belly and a social security office just down the road.

  "Phoo-ee! Ten jobs a fortnight you have to apply for. That's a lot, ay Shorty?"

  "Still better than a begging bowl in the middle of 200 million other begging bowls though Exane."

  "Too right mate! Too right. Could be the go then, so long as I don't get RSI filling in all of the forms."

At this point Lu Mi and Wendy and Jack fronted up to mess around with their selections. Becky came back too and declared that she wanted in. Ronald had blabbed to her about guru Ji's involvement and she couldn't pass up the opportunity to be involved in business which had the blessing of such a celestial celebrity. I had intended to surprise her with the good news once she'd made her decision, though I had no argument with the way spirit had short circuited me. We were at a bit of a loss as to how Wendy and Jack would fit into the picture, yet we knew that they would somehow. After they and Lu Mi had messed around with a few possible selections from the screens, we headed back to our pod quarters to jaw a bit more about what we were on about. It was all happening in heaven, there was absolutely no doubt about that. Later on we all went back to the screens and consolidated our choices. The countdown to embodiment again was now on and all of us started experiencing the usual astral nervousness that precedes physical materialisation.

 

 

                                           AN ENIGMA FOR THE PURPLES

 

 

  Purples are very advanced souls. They have evolved way beyond the need to reincarnate in physical bodies. They owe no one physical karma, not even themselves. They are out of the astral karma traps too. They inhabit the causal or mental worlds and they are blessed with extraordinary powers. Things are real because they say so, not because somebody else has said so. They can project their ideas holographically so that any idea that they have will instantaneously manifest around them. There are many levels or vibratory frequencies within the universal consciousness and it could be said that they occupy the 5th level, or dimension. The appearance or manifestation of one of these beings on or in a third level like the Earth would be overwhelming to minds there. In fact, third dimensional minds would consider purples to be gods, or goddesses. They usually are not though, they are just very advanced souls. They are compassionate and loving beings who up until this point in time have served the Maker well. For convenience sake, the following conversation is presented as if it were a play. A play in consciousness, that is.

 

 

Purple 1     This is unbelievable! What is the Silver saying that this Gold is on about? Is he saying that the Maker is holographically projected imagination, like the training holograms are?

 

Purple 2     No! I don't think so. Of course the Maker exists. The Maker has to exist because we say so.

 

Purple 3     But the Gold is telepathing that they are beyond the Maker! What did they say? The worlds are mine but what grows on them is Gods. That's absurd! Isn't it?

 

Purple 4    The Gold also said that they were never born nor have they ever died and that God is not responsible for their creation. What in the deuce are we supposed to make of that? How can a soul not be created? Surely the void must be a creation just as a world is! I expected anything but this people. I thought that once we'd reached this level that we'd breeze through it into the Silver's dimension and then we'd finally be close to making out with the Maker. You're dead right number 1, this is unbelievable. We'll soon have a cosmic revolution on our hands if we're not careful!

 

Purple 5    Yeah! To be having theological debates at our age sucks. This Gold ought to know what's going on though, after all, they are a fucken Gold!

 

Purple 6     I think that the gist of the message was that the mind creates holographically using imagination and desire. Then it invents a creator to explain the hurly burliness of what it's dealing with whilst it's embodied in either a physical, astral or causal body. Remember, no one here has ever seen a Gold but it is widely rumoured that they have omniversal consciousness. What'smore, asking a Silver what a Gold looks like is useless because they always answer that Golds are beyond any known description. They cannot be perceived with the mind, nor described with either terrestrial or celestial language. I think my sisters and brothers that what we are dealing with here is beyond appraisal. We will simply just have to accept that we are dealing with the unknown.

 

There were grunts of assent from the other Purples. They had heard great wisdom being expounded and they knew it.

 

  At this point something started to happen in the holy temple that the Purples were in. First of all each member of their council started to pick up intensely strong telepathic vibrations. The vibrations told them that the Silver was about to manifest in their company. Having already described the very high consciousness level of the Purples, it does not take much to imagine the super powerful nature of a Silver. Thus this entity arrived in a bewildering blaze of silvery light that exploded everywhere within the temple. The Purples had to shield their ethereal eyes momentarily until they'd adjusted to the brilliant intensity of the light. If a mere mortal had been present, their brains would have exploded right out of the top of their skull at a million miles per second. As it was, the Purples were still severely astonished. Their souls dreamt that one day they might be able to put out such a voluminous light.

  "I have another message from the Gold for you all," told the Silver.

  "The mind creates using imaginative desire and consciousness, being amenable to creation, takes upon itself a myriad of pictorial appearances. Having created diversity from oneness energy, the mind then invents a creator which dwells within and without the appearances. The painter is in the picture, so to speak. Neither God nor the universe have come to tell you that they have created you. Go beyond creation into the source of pure awareness to seek the nature of the one and only true reality, the absolute. The Nameless One. All else is false, mere illusions piled upon illusions. There was also a specific order that project Epsilon is to be passed without any debate or delay. Good luck, great love and goodbye. This image will self destruct before you have had time to think about it."

And so it was.

The Purples buzzed each other wildly. It appeared that number 6 had been right in their assessment of the situation. They were intoxicated with the delicious insights. They loved God with all of their hearts but the thought of actually being able to go beyond such an entity enthralled them. The plot of their existences was thickening like it had never thickened before. Super love from the top was coagulating within the very fibres of their ethereal beings.

  "Epsilon!," they petitioned each other.

  "What in the hell is that?"

  "Summon a Blue!," one of them cried out. "They ought know what's going on down below us in the lower layers of divine consciousness."

  So a Blue was summoned and quicker than a mortal can die in their sleep, guru Ritponnawannatta Ji materialised.

  "Yes masters?," he asked them politely. "How can I be of service to you?"

  "Epsilon Ji! Tell us all about it," they all went.

Guru Ji obliged them.

  "Shorty!," they all roared in disbelief. "But he's done nothing but farm asparagus for the last 300 years. Besides that, he's been bad to cats."

Guru Ji shrugged his shoulders, astral like.

  "Exane!," the Purples telepathed. "He'd be lucky to write his way out of a bucket of shit! Besides that, he's a frog killer."

The guru shrugged again. It wasn't his problem and if the truth be known, he didn't have any problems. He was just into life for the fun of it. It wasn't really his business if other beings wanted to stuff around with minds full of illusions.

  "Lu Mi!," the Purples went. "The whore! Wendy and Jack! Going as homosexuals? Good lord! All of these characters have so much karma to work off. Is there even the slightest chance that they will be successful Ji?," the Purples enquired.

  "How should I know?," came the reply back. Faster than a bullet it was too.

The Purples put their illustrious heads together and quicker than a nightmare in limbo, they came up with a plan.

  "Step forth and kneel Ritponnawannatta!," they ordered.

The guru did so and the sword of divine love was manifested. Purple one took it and placed it in succession on the master's mentally projected shoulders.

  "I dub thee a Purple," telepathed number one. "Welcome to our council."

The other Purples stepped forth to heartily congratulate master Ji, who appeared unmoved. He, the sometimes she, showed not the slightest inkling of excitement. Instead, the master quickly began issuing directions.

  "Open up all channels so that the nature of the Gold's transmissions are available to all on all levels!," he declared.

  "See to it number 4!," the other purples cried out.

  "At once!," ejaculated 4 as he took off to do his bit.

  "Epsilon is passed and has our full approval and blessings," said the guru. "Everyone, everywhere is to assist in the design of the plot of the whistleblowing book. All classes on all levels are to turn their attentions to it. We must have a think tank that has never before been seen in this universe. After that, perhaps an era will come when this thinking business can be done away with."

  "Right!," went the council. "Let it be known throughout infinity and eternity that Epsilon has the green light and our loving blessings."

And so it was.

 

 

 

 

                                                                     

 

                                             THREE ASTRAL DAYS LATER

 

  Shorty and I had fled to the park and were sitting by one of the lakes brooding and throwing astral pebbles into the bluer than blue, ethereal water.

  "Ploop!,' they went as they broke the lake's surface skin. "Ploop! Ploop! Ploop!"

In the last three days the entire astral world had gone nuts. Some...some motherfucker had recruited and ordered the involvement of every mother's son and daughter and their dogs in our project Epsilon. No one would leave us alone and we couldn't get a moment's peace. Apparently the Council Purple had ordered it, though we had no idea why. The result was though that everytime that we took a floating step forward, there would be a huge bunch of souls there telepathing their ideas of what should be in our whistleblowing book. It was driving us absolutely nuts so we had exercised the traditional right of being granted solitude before imminent physical reincarnation and had taken refuge in the holy park. We had stuck numerous PISS OFF! signs in the astral grass that surrounded us. So far no one had bothered us.

Things had also been hyper accelerated. Becky, Lu Mi, Jack and Wendy had already gone to ground and poor old Shorty had only 24 astral hours left before his tour of duty commenced. He was in a bad way, the anticipation was getting to him. I had 48 hours left before my departure. We had also been ordered to front up to the Council Purple. Normally the Yellows would have dealt with us before our rebirths. Things though had gotten way out of hand and we were both considerably edgy. Neither myself or Shorty had ever seen a Purple, let alone stand in front of their esteemed council. Besides that, we were nervous about going to ground again because it meant that we would have nerves in a body and we would once again have to do all of that shit that pertains to being human. Once you identify with just being a separate body mind there are no two ways about it. You're in for a hell of a ride.

  "If I ever get my hands on that mongrel (expletive) that told the masses about our Epsilon project, I'll murder the bastard!," Shorty grunted at me. 

  "That would be something mate," I told him, casually. It really was exceedingly mystical and deliciously peaceful by the lake. It was also a bonus to know that we wouldn't be disturbed. I looked over my astral shoulder at the PISS OFF! signs and I liked what I saw. In the far distance I could see the crystalline city where the Yellows hung out. That was quite something to witness as well. It certainly looked like paradise. The hues emanating from their hangout were awesomely unbelievable. It gurgled within my soul that one day Shorty and myself and the rest of the crew would be hanging out there.

  "I've been thinking," my mate continued, rather solemnly.

  "I figured out that if I live to be 60 in this forthcoming fucken life that I would have pooped approximately 25,000 to 35,000 times and urinated 75 to a 125,000 times. Maybe more, depending on whether I end up incontinent or not. I'll consume a tonne or 2 or 3 of food and spend 1000's upon 1000's of hours doing horrible stuff that I don't want to do, called school then work or paid employment. I'll in effect be a slave my entire life, to others and to my own illusions, desires and fears. During that time I'll possibly be dominated by and bossed around by beings who are deluded that they know something whilst I'll know that they know nothing, really. Because, how in the hell can anybody really know anything in an unreal, mind projected, dream movie? This hypocorism will only just enable me to obtain the corrupt, multi national backed government, printed coloured paper which will buy the food which will enable me to excrete and wipe my physical ass with softer white or coloured paper. I'll be sick 100's of times. I'll get into numerous arguments with both enemies and allies alike and 9 times out of ten I'll have to suppress the seemingly real desire to take them out of the holographic picture with my own bare hands. I'll watch 10,000 football and cricket games on tv that mean practically nothing. I'll hear and view reluctantly several million advertisements that will antagonise the hell out of me. I'll also pull several tonnes of junk mail from out of my letterboxes and without looking at them throw them in the rubbish bin. I will suffer endlessly from the first day that I have a so called rational thought because the so called rational thoughts will initiate a mental figuring out process that goes around and around in circles, driving me insane. Every bit of transient pleasure that I get will lead to pain of some description and the end of every pain that I experience will lead to another transient, short lived pleasure that is followed by more pain. Be it physical, emotional, mental or spiritual in origin, the angst of being an unknown, unfathomable quantity will be with me either consciously or unconsciously all of my waking hours."

Shorty paused. I thought that he had said his bit. Instead he projected one of the most depressingly morbid, pitiful, poor me faces that I had ever seen. He looked absolutely grotesque. Then he continued.

  "I will pine for almost every woman that I clap my eyes on," he telepathed.

  "Unlike James Bond though I'll only get to make out with a handful of them. Of that handful, one or two will give me a little love that will possibly be followed by more karmic trouble than I've known in the rest of my preceding life. I will be bemused by duality, fooled completely by matter appearances and eventually the mind that I'm endowed with will turn inwards upon itself. Despite that this will be my one and only salvation, I'll then find myself in a vicious self hate, self love circle from which there is seemingly no escape. Meditating with such restlessness within will be harder than farting my way to the moon. I'll probably resort to drugs at an early age to try and get over the suffering and boredom which will possibly bring me into contact with legalised hypocrites as well as exacerbating my rapidly developing neuroses. Most likely that will make me seek out a shrink until I realise that it is shrinks who are the ones who are most in need of spiritual counsel. I'll...."

  "It's just a holographic life mate!," I hollered, trying to sidetrack him.

  "It's no big deal! There are a few good illusions there. You'll get the odd rut and maybe you'll wind up contemplating the I Am and become incredibly spiritual. Who knows? Maybe you'll crack the matrix and end up the guru yourself. After all, we've all got our own inner guide, the sadguru, ay?," I telepathed to my pessimistic friend.

  "We're all exactly equal that way Shorty," I told him.

  "We've all got the same potential to realise our divine origins. Thus insighting ourselves that we don't need enlightenment because we're already the light. We're made of light energy here, we're made of light energy there and everything is made of light energy,ay? All that we need to do then whilst we're doing the Earth is to wake up to who we really are as spirits in the flesh, ay? We don't have to acquire anything. Rather, all that is required is that we simply be our true selves whilst letting go of all of the illusory stuff that the thought language and social consciousness conditions us to falsely identify with."

Shorty looked at me sideways and pulled one of his best deadpan, aggressive faces. For a moment I thought that he was going to throw an astral punch at me.

  "I couldn't give a stuff from here about sex mate!," he roared.

  "You know that! Images on a mind screen, so what? A mind screen populated by people fooled that they are a body mind or person flaunting their imaginary wares in divine ignorance. Here! Look at my lusciously beautiful tits or look at my big cock! Big deal. They can have their sex. It's cosmic consciousness that I want! I want awareness of the whole cosmos, not to be deluded by some currant of a mind that I'm some piddly little particularised piece of the universe trapped in a dying body in some stupid dreamworld."

  "Well we'll get there mate...one day," I answered with as much conviction that I could muster. Boy! I'd never seen Shorty so worked up. He was normally so acid cool, at least whilst in the astral he was.

  "How long though Exane?," he practically screamed back at me.

  "How many more of these mad  picture lives do we have to do before we get some sort of an insightful break? I mean, don't you think that we deserve that something should give us contact with our spirits whilst we're doing the insane Earth? Haven't we suffered enough? I'm bored mate! I'm bored shitless with all of this re run shit. I just don't know that I can cut it with this nonsensical, holographic crap anymore."

  "Conquering the wheel of karma is entirely up to us Shorty!," I roared back at him.

  "You know that! It's within all of our destinies, she'll be right. Cool down before you blow a fucken fuse! Just try and identify with the light that is projecting the pictures when you're there and not the pictures themselves. Remember, you're projecting into the Earth movie and your soul is safe at home. That's all that you can do. That's all that any of us can do. Anyway, we've got this Epsilon job ahead of us so maybe we won't have time to get confused or develop galling limitations whilst we're there. The insights will be coming at us thick and fast from our mighty allies here so maybe something will happen this time around and we'll wake up to our spirits whilst were there," I advised.

  "Exane!," he retorted back at me as he projected another face with the most severe expression on it. It looked like he was in agony.

  "You know that by the time that you're three years old in that (expletive expletive) of an Earth hell hole that you won't have a (expletive) clue about how the pictures are coming to you! Your attached mind will have you deadset convinced that what is solid is real and the language as it is instilled and indoctrinated into you will reinforce those false perceptions. C'mon! What chance have we got of breaking through that false reality into the truer spirit one? Pretty well fuck all, if you ask me. It's as I said to Angelica. The Earth hologram is too hard! It's unjust, it's cruel, it's barbaric and it's too difficult. No soul should have to go through that horrible shit!"

  "What! Do you want out of Epsilon?," I asked him, somewhat aghast.

Shorty's face, or the one that he was currently projecting, lit up like an atom bomb. At the same time something clicked within my soul and momentarily I really felt like throwing an astral king hit his way. He smiled divinely again as he read me. The telepathy going back and forth between us was like electricity. Longitudinal sparks were blowing out of our whispy, light bodies. I have said this many times and I will say it again. Formlessness is a gas. It just feels so good. So soul right, so natural.

  "No way!," the little punk roared at me. "I wouldn't miss Epsilon for all of the dope in the universe!  At long, long last I finally feel like I'm going to have some real fun doing a holgraphic Earth life. I can't wait to get down there and give it a shake!"

I realised fully that he had been pulling my astral leg.

  "You conning, cunning bugger!," I yelled back at him. "You've been having me on! You horrible little fucker!"

  "Just reinforcing the coming duality old son!," he explained. 

  "That's all that I was doing. Pardon the mental games but I was just testing out the scribe to see how his attitudinal set is before imminent holographic birth. It's important that out of all of us that you have absolutely the right intent before we go. The others suggested I give you a run down and run around and I have to admit, you did reasonably well. You passed the test and I'll give you a six out of ten, the devil's pass into hell!"

  "I was just trying to cheer you up!," I roared, delighted that the Shorty was his old self again and that he had only been playing a game.

  "I agree with everything that you said, after all, you only told the truth. Mind you, what you anticipate as reality is what you'll get. Ay? Tell y'self it's going to be hard and it'll be hard. That's where we have to start mate. We have to tell ourselves from here that what's in front of us is going to be deadset easy, a joyride. The Self is always near, within easy reach. No sense in drugging ourselves with limitations before we're even standing on the dirt. Ay old son?," I astral winked at him. "Epsilon will be a piece of piss. We'll shit it in! Especially with the guru Ji backing us up."

Shorty howled with divine laugher. I did too and we both burst into our favourite pre-reincarnation song.

  "Here we (expletive) go! Here we (expletive) go! Here we (expletive) go!," we sang. 

My mate and I, sitting by that holographically projected, wonderfully beautiful lake, we sang our astral heads off. Around the 4th dimension, they heard us bellowing on and on and they laughed and laughed too. Like a couple of crazy kookaburras we were.

  After we'd calmed down a bit, we got into a discussion about the mindsets that we would be endowed with whilst doing the Earth hologram. The mind is an instrument, like a guitar or a piano, divinely designed to serve spirit, that is all. It is an unbelievably, awesomely powerful tool that, depending on the intent that it is or is not tuned with, can make or break a life. Most so called humans get into the same sort of trap with it though. They say my mind not the mind or a mind and they slave away their entire existences trying to get that mind to serve their personalities. Get me this, get me that, figure it out, get me outa hell they say to their instrument. Now up until a point the mind will do this and then it will go off on its own tangents. It will almost take upon itself a full fledged, independent existence and it will run crooked rings around its temporary landlord or landlady. Once the host body energy succumbs to the lopsidedly biased, illusion filled, word dominated, one dimensional postulation of reality that the mind has either been taught or dreamt up, (the so called exterior world and the inner beliefs as to what is real or not, what is liked and what is disliked) the mind, safe within its ego language keeps re running the same dream projections. It knows that it's on a roll and it has a ball no matter how distorted or disturbed the engendered pictures are. Its ego component ruthlessly uses beliefs like humans use money. The mind and the ego have a falsely perceived, paranoid fear of dissolution or annihilation. They fear permanent exclusion from the cosmic big picture. The true reality is though that the higher spirit power wishes to include them in it's hidden agenda game of divine exaltation into the cosmic consciousness state.

  Once the ego mind has settled into it's third dimensional survival pattern, it will do almost anything to prevent the host spirit from reaching out or journeying to the higher, multi dimensional consciousness levels. It cannot stop astral excursions through dreams though it will use all sorts of stuff to prevent conscious sojourns into the wider identity of formless spirit. The basic, braking innuendo is however the assertion or belief that because of the apparent reality of duality, if the host does venture into the higher realms, because it supposedly has more selfishness than divine light in its embodiment, those higher realms will be polluted. This is the I am spiritually unworthy trip and it involves having attachment to a poor me, victim attitude and a degree of guilt. Guilt is exceedingly limiting stuff. The host backs off when the mind gets into it, frightened at the prospects of disturbing divinity by letting their own brand of selfish, I me mine, ego shit loose in the unconscious heaven. They stay in the narrow, psychicless, perceptual ranges then doing the same old re run stuff and the vicious cycle of suffering within self consciousness continues. Round one, the mind and the ego win. They have successfully reinforced limitation by negating divinity and the host starts looking for pleasures in the material sphere once again. They play act I am a body mind whereas in the true reality they are no such thing. In the true reality they are all the same light energy. They are all of the bodies and minds. It is the attached mind which has separated the light energy into individualised, solidified names and shapes. That is one of it's jobs.

  So, conned and deceived by this, the people get drunk, take some drugs, have some sex, go to work, curse the boss or the politicians, buy this or that, visit their therapist, rob a bank, watch or play some sport, attend to their particular God created religious business if they have any, go to the movies, switch the tv, video or computer on, get revolutionary about this cause or that, etc, etc, etc. They're good little citizens, obeying or protesting, consuming and dying without hardly ever uttering a whimper for spirit. Everytime that they flick a switch or step out of their door, they make money for a multinational company and their world wide empire and employees. Carefree and happy the citizens might appear to be, or, if circumstances have not been favourable to them, they are severely stern faced. Underneath though, behind their societalised faces, the boredom, fear, sorrow, the ennui of their existences, their embroglionic suffering and their simmering angers reign supreme. Sure they get a bit of love and have some fun sometimes. Ask them about the trouble in their lives though and you had better be prepared to listen to a long tale of woe. At the slightest cessation of frantic activity or at the drop of the slightest silence, the fear, boredom, anger and confusion in them bubbles up like unconscious lava. What next?, they ask. What next? Who or what will entertain me? What can I do that will sidetrack my mind from having to ask that awesomely terrifying question? Who am I really and what is this third dimensional life business actually about?

The spirit counteracts these I am limited obsessions by manufacturing and manifesting crisis episodes in the individual's life. Nervous breakdowns, disease, crack ups, severe doubts, anxiety, neuroses and other chronic troubles are all the work of the soul's spirit attempting to reach out to and change the wayward, misguided direction of the energy embodied within and without the host vehicle. The host vehicle might be running around chasing fame, fortune, sex, drugs, knowledge, power or whatever but the soul or inner Self delivers, sometimes quite violently (through the wake up call which is the crisis) its crucially important, back to the drawing board message. Through the crisis, massive life changes are enforced upon the individual and the life power shifts back from the ego to the spirit, where it belongs. The eternal soul push towards cosmic consciousness can then continue.

 

  There are basically three types of minds upon the Earth. There are the accepters, the accepter-rejecters and the pure rejecters. Accepters believe in the reality of the Earth hologram and they are totally convinced that solidity is real. Accepter-rejecters, the midway bunch, have an inkling that something is up. They are seekers who have a rudimentary understanding that the Earth is a virtual reality zone. Despite this however, their survival orientation and the group mind consensus pushes them to remain attached to the apparency of solidity. Rejecters on the other hand, have broken through the matrix of life. They are totally aware that the Earth is mind projected illusion and they refuse to accept it as real. They may appear to be bodily in it, yet their spirits are roaming across the entire range of consciousness and beyond. They have cosmic consciousness whereas the former two states are still struggling with the self conscious level. Rejecters are aware that they are made of light whilst the other two groups think that they are built of blood and bone. Rejecters will assist the others to grow in awareness, like our guides do with us. That is their job, sometimes.

  "I guess that we'll have to go with rejecter mindsets," Shorty telepathed to me.

I had been watching the effervescent, crystalline sparkling going on above the lake and I focussed on my friend with a lucid smile on my mentally projected face. My luminous, whispy white, light form was moving about as though a gentle breeze was blowing it around. I felt like some sort of magician waiting to go on stage to perform his act. I am also not afraid to admit that I was quite nervous about Epsilon. I didn't want to let the team down and I wasn't sure that I could pull off a successful book.

  "I think that we'll have to run the gauntlet and do the first two and progress to the rejecter mode," I told my good mate.

Shorty grunted with considerable distaste evident in his grunt.

  "I knew that you were going to say that!," he ejaculated.

  "I hate hating," he sighed.

  "It's so alien to my soul! I can't stand envy, jealousy, greed, ignorance, selfishness, conflict, war, fighting and short lived passion. I much prefer to love my mates forever, like we do here. I despise  feeling rotten and being all clogged up with contradictory and haywire emotions. It drives me nuts when I judge someone's shape or essence before they've even sat down or opened their mouths. It makes me feel like I'm a Nazi. Oh mate! Such holographic bullshit. What a drag that we just couldn't slip into the rejecter mode and forget the others."

  "We'll have to do the others to reach the searching, questioning state," I grunted back. "You know that comrade. Besides, you love it all y'bastard! I saw the expression on that face that you were wearing when you were chopping those cats up. You know that both our sufferings and our joys are divine. It is written."

  "Yeah!," went Shorty. "And I saw the glint in y'eyes when you were acid frying that poor, defenceless frog. I guess that we're two of a kind brother."

  "Yeah!  We'll be paying for it in these next lives though, ay?," I asserted.

  "Yeah! We sure will mate," Shorty fired back. "Do you think that our plan to rectify all of that shit will work? With what we've come up with you'd think that we were terrorists or the gas on, gas off dudes at Dachau, or something."

  "We'll sort it mate. We'll sort it."

  "Yeah!"

We were pretty confident considering that we were fully aware that we were in for a hell of a lot of holographic trouble. It was at this point in our discussion though that the sky ground that we were perched on began to wobble.

  "Hello! Something's up," Shorty cried out.

  It sure was. As we turned around the wobbling increased until it resembled quake status. Then there was an absolutely massive explosion of light such as we had never witnessed before. It was predominantly purple though every other conceivable colour was mixed in with it. For a moment, we were convinced that we were going to die before we could be born again. Appearances and sensations though, can be grossly misleading. Thus, when it had all settled down, we were confronted with the super loving figure of guru Ji. He had obviously, gone purple.

  "Ahh punks!," he telepathed to us. "I thought that I might find you here, brooding and planning as usual."

  "Master!," we cried out joyously as we rushed excitedly towards him.

  "Congratulations! Your purple fits you like a glove. Truly are you worthy of such an honour!"

  "A trifle!," he answered. "A lot of poppycock, if you ask me. Whether I am white, black or anything inbetween, I am still the light that I am. To hell with the I am this, I am that. It's all nonsense. I am, I exist, I love and that's all that there is to it. Now, to matters of far more import. How are your plans going? Have you sorted out the last details?"

  "Well, more or less," we said gingerly.

  "We were just discussing progression to the beginning of the rejecter state," Shorty informed him.

The master seemed pleased.

  "Good!," he responded.

  "The sooner that you can get yourselves into psyches of absolute despair and confusion, the better. Hard or ignorant parents, lots of silly drugs, a fear based, hypocritical society and karmic love affairs will do the trick. Where are you headed?"

  "Oz!," we ejaculated simultaneously.

  "Oh! Snorkers and vaginamite ay? Good oh! A good choice boys. Excellent."

Both Shorty and I were rapt that the Ji was pleased. Our little lights shone like candles in a dark room. He floated in front of us, glowing like a cosmic sun. Periodically, streaks of the finest white light seemed to shoot out of his embodiment and disappear out into the universe. Some of them brushed past us and made us ecstatically dizzy. Silly smirks came upon our projected faces.

  "Now lads!," the master said, ignoring our smirks.

  "You do realise that you're in for one hell of a ride? No doubt you'll be bullied sick by ignorant assholes whilst you're young. You'll be doing the concentration camp, schooling shit that will prepare you for nothing. The resentments and angers will build up early and the minds that you're endowed with will swim with negative emotions until your love affairs. These will placate you temporarily until you end up in karmic wars with your partners who will eventually reject you. Remember, your holy mission is to ASAP stop identifying with being a body mind that is deeply immersed in a solid picture and to see yourselves as pure spirit that is silently outside, merely witnessing a jolly good, most entertaining show. Which indeed, the Earth nonsense is. Unless you make it to that spot, you've no chance of completing Epsilon. Is that understood?"

  "Yes master!," we went.

Shorty had a question and so stuck a holographic hand up. Guru Ji bid him to get it out.

  "I was just wondering master," he telepathed.

  "The Earth is a sick world and it's people are even sicker. There's more fucked up units running around the Earth than there are in the rest of the entire universe. How..."

  "The Earth is a child of love Shorty and everyone on it has the infinite flame of cosmic consciousness burning within their heart, that is a fact. Already you are identifying with being a picture body being ruled by the transient imagination of a mind. Remember, you are the Supreme Soul and so is everyone else. Together, you are that infinite and vast expanse of consciousness and beyond that appears as many but is in reality, ONE," our guru said.

  "Yes master!," Shorty kind of roared. The kid was enthusiastic, I had to give him that. Still though, he persisted with his question.

  "The mind though, once indoctrinated with language, develops verbal diarrhoea, inside and out," he asserted. "Using memory and the superficial language, being caught inbetween desire and fear, it then re runs everything to the shithouse and back. Particularly dislikes or angers. When one is angry at a particular person or the unbelievable ignorance level of a hypocritical society, how does one counter that? That's what I want to know because every time that I go there, I get snared by re running the same venomous shit through the mind. It drives me nuts because of the possibility that I could become ultra violent. I see some grey suited, narrow minded, fat assed, over paid, con artist of a politician on the tv screen and I just want to do an Elvis and get myself a thunderbox of a revolver and blow the screen, or them, away."

  "Who are you Shorty?," the master asked.

Shorty looked a bit non plussed.

  "I'm an agent for Epsilon!," he answered eventually.

  "Good oh!," said the master.

  "Are you not also the Supreme Reality? Will not, because your true energy body is infinite, the world be inside you and not outside? Which means there is nothing to fear, hate or despise because it's all your Self expressing as innumerable picture shapes. At source, being infinite light and beyond, are you not spaceless, timeless, causeless and changeless? Born never, nor died ever, your being-non being unfolds gloriously forever, having endless fun. There, in the void of the perfection of bliss, still silence and peace, are you not the identity behind every other identity? Dimensionless you are at root, yet with an infinity of dimensions to explore. The ONE that projects the many so that the spirit through the many can have some sport by surmounting masses of illusory difficulties. Remember this my son, as soon as you can manage it, give up all questions except one. Ask only, who am I and what makes me conscious? Dismiss anything that is tainted or mind polluted with I am this or that as false. You will recognise the this or thats easily because they will be loaded with judgements and they will be transient. Only I am, I exist is changeless and can prosper you because it will take you to how do I exist which will lead to full realisation that you exist as the many, yet are in fact the ONE. It's dead easy once you get the hang of it. True reality stares every human in the face. It is not located in some far off future or universe. It is with you all the time, it is you and all that you have to do to allow it to get to you is to offload the bundle of illusions that are clogging up and clouding out the wonderfully powerful mind. The mind is the wife of the heart and it's true job is to work for spirit and not to be a slave to the endless fears and desires of personality. If the re runs play havoc with you, persevere and endure with your meditations until the blessed I am thought/feeling takes over and dissolves all of the shit. Meditation will be essential to you in accomplishing that transition from the angry bastard to the understandingly aware, spiritual perspective. I have every confidence in you laddie that you'll be able to pull it off because you are the Supreme Soul. Trust me, I know what I'm talking about Shorty."

  "Yes master. I'll do my best. I'll give it my best shot. If I end up murdering some asshole or myself though, you won't hold it against me, will you?"

  "Of course not laddie! Don't even think about failure. That's a this or that. Remember though, a foolish death invites a foolish rebirth. You are the light of the omnipotent spirit and that's all that there is to it. That's the only fact about you that this universe or any other will accept as the divine truth!"

  "Good oh master!," ejaculated Shorty.

  "Ta mate!"

Shorty could be a cheeky bugger sometimes. The master didn't mind though. He just laughed and chuckled away as though he was about to give birth to another galaxy, or universe.

  "I've got a question too master," I telepathed.

  "Shoot!," said the Ji.

  "I find that whenever I do the human, I get caught up with all of this imaginary, dreaming shit. I don't mean just perceiving solidity and taking the unreal for the real, I mean the societal conditioning stuff. You know, that to be a somebody instead of a nobody one has to have fame, fortune, lots of girls or boys and sex, a toilet seat made of gold and all of that sort of stuff. I get into these ego daydreams I guess and they drive me nuts. I know that the real spiritual heroines and heroes are silent achievers and they couldn't care less about recognition, but the average human ego loves the glory of attention. Everybody loves to be loved for being what they are. They'll also get into being loved or worshiped for what they are not at the drop of a hat. Many live only for self glorification. What should I do about this appalling state master? It distracts me so and life after life I fall into the same silly trap."

  "You could always go as a bagman Exane and just obverse how the rest of the race runs around chasing nothing in particular. If you have nothing then you can't be shit scared of losing everything, can you? True happiness is within. It is where the I is not. It is never at the mercy of circumstances such as a bank crash, body illness or the fickleness of public opinion or attention. A leper amongst their friends or a bagperson wandering around unbound to anybody or anything can be happier than a stressed out billionaire trying to hold onto or increase their illusory empire. However, for Epsilon, I suggest full utilisation of the witness mode. Don't try and stop, judge or oppose anything that the mind dreams up or imagines, just realise that it's not you that's doing it. It's the transient pollution of a mind fooled by the magic illusion of matter. Tell yourself no, not this, I don't want it and just float over it or around it observing. Say continually to yourself, there is imagining going on, that is all and be happy for your ego that it's having a good time in make believe land. Because it won't and cannot last. In life, the false has no chance. It may seemingly live for a while, though sooner or later it will succumb to the reality that spirit holds all of the aces.

Remember, many who are famous die with the most acute suffering going on in what they are convinced is their particular mind. Eventually, if you witness enough you will end up laughing at the antics of the ego and it's desires for fame and so forth. After all, the real desire underneath is to kill the twin fears of extinction and unworthiness and to be loved and respectfully appreciated, which is every soul's dream and divine right. Before you can be really loved though, you must love the omnipotent reality of spirit. With the entirety of your being too, with all of your glorious heart. If you try to fight imaginary, daydreaming stuff on the level of the mind however, you will end up in severe conflict. So, be careful and watch yourself continuously. Take risks but scrupulously assess your steps. Each step is the goal and all steps lead to the goal. Watch your desires and question, who desires and what is really worth desiring? If you desire only for yourself, your achievements will be limited and you will probably wind up in the severe shits. If however you desire for Self, for the good of all, the entire universe will back you and you will experience the supreme success."

  "Thankyou master, I will."

  "Now boys, I gather by now that you've sussed out that I represent the Council Purple, so lean back. I've got a little present for you each to take with you on your most exciting adventures. How about a booster shot before you dive deep, ay?"

  "Powerbolt! Powerbolt!," Shorty whispered excitedly into my astral ear.

Powerbolts are super condensed units of explosive light energy which ascended masters sometimes throw at souls before they reincarnate. They are designed to bolster that soul's energy so that they might complete their holy mission without too much fuss. Usually, one has to have achieved yellow status before they are given. Shorty and I had never had one though we had heard the most exquisite tales about them from both Kenneth and Angelica. Others too. My mate and I, we braced ourselves whilst the guru Ji started to do all of these contortions.

  The Ji mutated, he shape shifted, he got real big and then he got real small. Primordial colours burst forth from him in a vaporous rapidity. Sheets of divine light roared past us at a million miles per hour. For a moment he became transparent and appeared to be full of this universe and the others too. It was an astonishing and absolutely wicked show which went on for some time. Shorty and I were intoxicated with it and for a while we even forgot about the promised powerbolts. Eventually though he returned to his usual format and his beautiful, holographic arms were raised above his divine head. In each hand he held a zig zagged, glowing, silvery white, fizzing powerbolt.

  "Jesus! Have mercy!," we simultaneously screamed as he hurled them at us. At infinite speed, with an accompanying noise that would have scared Satan half out of his wits, they bore down upon us.

They got us right inbetween our astral eyes and we immediately became extremely muzzy with the most exquisite, divine joy. Five hundred of my former lives flashed before my inner eye in a split second. I saw universes that I had never dreamt could exist. Several hundred lucid realisations exploded within me simultaneously. I experienced the tiniest, eensiest flash of the unknown and the beyond and the power of that forced me to crumple into a heap onto the astral deck. Shorty must have had the same sensations run through him because he was already writhing around the floor like a drunk. For some time we lay there with all of this beautiful stuff going on within our souls. We couldn't move, we couldn't telepath and we couldn't scratch our astral asses. We had numerous poetic visions, several conversations with Goddesses and Gods from far away universes and we saw the Earth in a completely different, other dimensional light. We saw that it was populated with egg shaped organisms which had thread like tails. When they moved, they left grooves or tracks in the ether upon which their world was built. They were extraordinarily colourful and when they were mobile they created these incredibly symmetrical patterns which intertwined with the patterns of others. The overall effect was very much like that created by an enormously delicate and wondrous spider web. No computer could have reproduced it.

  I had never in my wildest dreams thought that the Earth hologram could produce such an intricate and intense, geometrical beauty. I was moved to the very depths of the bowels of my soul. It changed my perceptions considerably and I experienced the acute insight that there was coming a time when the Earth would be crawling with beings possessing the cosmic consciousness state. From there they could love all that is whereas from the self conscious level there love was too often transient and subject to galling, ego expectations. Heaven would saturate the planet with its light and from the far corners of every known universe sentient entities would come to play together in the paradise state. I had a distinct vision of spaceships of every conceivable size, shape and colour buzzing around this world. I saw a parking lot for these vehicles that seemed to take up half of the rest of the universe. I witnessed life forms that I never previously knew existed. On this planet they mingled freely without the slightest hint of animosity or conflict. It was one, giant party.

They even converted to heightened awareness the ones who used to be the bad guys from inner and outer space. It was as though the United Nations of space races had come together to party on one world. Or, more specifically, an enormous variety of soul types had decided to embody themselves in an enormous variety of different body types within the same hologram. This was important because normally most souls don't mingle extensively with members of distant pods, neither do different body types usually consort together. The message was implicit then. There were changes going on in high places that were going to be reflected in the low vibration, rapidly ripening to the very high vibration, training hologram known by so many as Earth. The planet then was more special than I had ever realised and to a certain extent I felt quite humble about being given the opportunity to do some more business there. Especially where Epsilon was concerned because it's a drag to see self as being separate and disconnected from other bodies and things. Loneliness and sorrow are horrible illusions. It's also just not true because from the holographic, spiritual  perspective, we are ONE energy. We are One with both God and Goddess, no matter who created who. We are One with each other, the Earth, this universe, the others too and most delightful of all, we are ONE with the Supreme Reality of Self or the Supreme Soul. A polluted, desire bent, fear ridden, third dimensional mind cannot see this. It's impossible from the self conscious state. A mind purified through the elimination of wrong ideas and wrong identifications though will be aware of it instinctively and its host will proceed to cosmic consciousness faster than a speeding bullet.

  I don't know how long it was that Shorty and I were rolling around in the astral dirt. I've just got no idea. When we came out of it we couldn't spot the guru anywhere. Just as well because we both felt a bit embarrassed about having hit the deck. We attempted, after we'd managed to get ourselves upright, to float away to get back to the pod. Try as we may though we just couldn't get astrally airborne. So we sent out an AAP.( Astral Assistance Please)

  "That Ji, he throws a mean bolt. Phoo! I'm absolutely, undeniably, cosmically stuffed!," Shorty finally managed to telepath.

I mumbled something back. I've got no idea what it was and whatever it was, I'm pretty sure that Shorty didn't comprehend it. I felt numb all over and my conscious was just about mute. I am, I said to myself. It bounced around the mind that was attached to me like a musical dot.

Booing! Booing! Booing!, it went.

  "Shorty! Exane! What happened?," approaching voices telepathically cried out to us.

We looked up. Our guides, Angelica and Kenneth were hurriedly floating towards us. Right behind them Ronald, Max, Cheryl, Elizabeth, Bruce and a bunch of others followed. We tried to tell them about the Ji's powerbolts but nothing came out. Some of them got either side of our flanks. They lifted us up and the whole lot of us headed slowly for our pod. I could just make out the horizons of the enormous cavernous area that was our astral abode and after a while I spotted the lights of numerous pods. They were like bunches of lit up grapes. When finally we reached home, Shorty headed immediately for his cone, from where he would project his soon to be, next Earth life. The poor, little bugger was in need of a quick, celestial rest before he got underway with his next Earthly projection. I went in and positioned myself beside him. Softly, in the dream state, we communicated a few things dealing with meetings that we would have on your world. I really loved Shorty and I told him so numerous times as we chatted quietly. He was a hell of a soul and I wanted to rev him up good and proper for the job ahead. We would need to be the best of brothers to each other to get the work done. We would need to remember that we were the real ETs and that the universe was our extraordinary ship. All of the universes joined together constituted our Mothership.

  After we had finished with our last minute arrangements, he began his projection. The major part of his soul remained dormant in a trance like condition in its pod cone. Shorty had just enough energy left there to signal me with the equivalent of a thumbs up. Slowly, I assisted the projected part of him as he floated outside of the pod. We call the projected part the same as you sometimes do. We call it the spirit. As I helped Shorty's spirit on its trek towards the descenscion tubes, crowds began to gather on either side of the path. They threw astral flowers onto the road. By now, Epsilon had achieved cult status and there were 1000's upon 1000's of astral beings who wanted to give the little guy a rousing send off. Shorty, nursing his energy quotient, waved gently to the assembled masses as if he were the Pope. He blessed everybody left and right and he blessed the ones that closed in behind us to form the rear. He gave them all a solid thumbs up and every ounce of love that his indomitable soul possessed.

  "Give 'em hell!," some character cried out as we passed by.

  "Stir the shit out of them Shorty!," someone else yelled.

  "Enlighten the materially doped to the eyeballs, karma drugged masses with your phenomenal spirit mate!," was another comment.

  "Tell 'em that they're just drugged, holographic projections of the cinematic Self Shorty!," was another.

On and on the statements went as being after being shouted out their support for Epsilon. It is absolutely amazing high and low how something once started can snowball and capture the love or ire and attention of so many. The words of a prophet, a game, boat people, a murder trial, a war, a film, a song, a book or whatever can all become super hot items virtually overnight. They are all products that someone markets though only the most discerning of consumers can tell which item or items will be the most materially or spiritually profitable investment. To the real discerners go that which is eternal. To those who indulge in folly go that which is transient, unreal and spiritually worthless.

We hadn't gone much further when a thunderous chant erupted.

  "Shorteee!....Shorteee!....Shorteee!," it went.

My mate was most pleased and exceedingly flattered with the attention. He wore a mile wide smirk all of the way to the tubes. He was shining.

  "Fuckers!," I heard him gurgle away as he gave another thumbs up to the crowds on either side of the astral road.

  When we finally reached the tubes, we waited in line for Shorty's go button. The tubes are always busy. We didn't mind though because it gave us the chance to have a last chat. We went through the coordinates of our intended meetings again and I reminded him about his cat karma. He nodded affirmatively and then he passed the point of no return. I managed a pat on his astral back and then I could go no further.

  "I'll see you in hell brother!," were my last astral words to him.

  "Heaven on Earth brother!," he quipped back.

The operators then got a hold of him and locked him in. He gave us all one last thumbs up and then tumbled into his allocated tube. True to his divine nature, he let out a massive Tarzan cry as he fell. This pleased the crowd who had turned out to watch his temporary execution no end. Some of them shed tears of laughter. No one doubted that Shorty had guts or in fact, that anyone who played the Earth hologram had guts.

  I wandered back through the dispersing crowds and headed towards Becky's pod. It was next door to my own so I wasn't going too far out of my way. Many beings wished me luck as I floated by them. I acknowledged them and nodded my projected head this way and that. Many of them telepathed ideas to me and I nodded at them as well. Then, some character whom I had never seen before and who bumped into me said something which quite astounded me. It was so original and simple that neither I or anyone else had thought of it. I was, when he telepathed it though, in a bit of a dream. I was thinking how soon was my imminent departure and when what he said hit home, I turned around quickly. Quite spellbound I was too. I was most eager to discuss his insight with him but he had gone. I had lost him with my delayed response. I couldn't see him anywhere, he had vanished like a phantom. I asked around and questioned being after being as to the stranger's identity. No one knew him though. It was all very strange and by the time that I reached Becky's pod I was practically laughing at the divine simplicity of the unknown soul's message. He had merely said to me to write the truth in the whistleblowing book. That is, to tell exactly the astral arrangements as they had actually happened. This was a revelation. I decided to seek out Ronald and the rest of the insight crew and instruct them to pass on everything that they could so that my coming projection would remember, even if only in imagination or dreams, Epsilon. First though, I wanted a last word with my beloved Becky.

  I entered the pod and floated over to her cone. She was as beautiful as ever and appeared to be in a deep, meditative trance. This, of course, is normal for souls who have projected lives going on. Becky, like Shorty, was another fantastic soul mate of mine. I loved doing the Earth with her because when she gave particularised love, (love of one individual) there was nothing else in the hologram that came near it. Apart from super deep meditation or cosmic consciousness, that is. When she withdrew her attentions, which is quite normal for transient, karmic love, it was another story. However, I was quite willing to pay the price of having her to fuck around with for a while. I had done so before and it was quite possible, if she was agreeable, that I might do so again. There is as much spiritual ground to be gained handling the end of karmic love as there is being in the beginning and middle of it. Sometimes there is more. All of this aside, Beck had this wonderful habit of clothing herself in the most amazing bodies. Every time that she donned a body, it drove me bloody wild. Of course, it was all illusion though I think that even mortals are aware that some illusions are better than others. The female curves are pretty hard to top. What's that saying of Earth dwellers? Love is a many splendid illusion. Now that's ignorance because love as the omnipotent energy is the Source, the Supreme Reality and there is nothing more real than the Supreme Reality.

I watched as Beck's whispy light wafted this way and that and through dream I sent her a little, love message. Nothing like starting the romance off early, I thought.

  "Get ready superbitch!," I told her.

  "Pucker up!...I'm a coming!"

One of her holographic arms appeared from out of her light and she gave me a thumbs up. I laughed and gave her a soul kiss. Then she said something through the dream state. It was very soft and I didn't quite catch it. I was amazed that she had the strength to get a telepathic message out in the first place. I leant in real close and mingled my light with hers.

  "What was that Beck?," I asked her.

She repeated it and this time I understood her one hundred percent.

  "Come and get me motherfucker!," she said.

 

 

 

                                                                       *

 

 

 

  "Ha! Ha! Ha!," roared Carol as she shook her head.

Although she had found some of what she had so far read a bit hard to fathom, she had been able to identify with the last bit. She was thinking that it was a pity that some writer's broke up their stories with theoretical bits. She considered that the script might need a touch of editing though apart from that it seemed to be interesting her. It seemed actually to be dealing with the sorts of problems that she was having and that indeed everybody has. The idea that humans are not bodies, minds, thoughts or feelings was not new to her. Her brothers who had gone spiritual in India had written to her about such unbelievable, anti-consensus reality stuff. She was wondering how accurate the description of astral life as portrayed in the book was. She asked herself if there could be any truth in it or if it was just the writer's imagination. She wondered also what had killed Eddie Titt. He sounded like the sort of bloke that she wouldn't have minded having a cup of coffee and a chat with. Shorty, she felt, was a fun character. The unknown soul who had bumped into Exane and told him to write the truth about Epsilon she thought had to be the guru Ji. Some women have pretty good intuition when it comes to mighty important matters and Carol was no exception.

 

 

 

                                                                        *

 

 

 

 

  I left Becky laughing my astral head off and went and found Ronald and the rest of my insight crew. I told them what I wanted them to dish up to me whilst I was doing Earth and I told them what the lady Beck had said. They laughed their astral heads off as well. Some bright spark even commented that my future partner could have been just about any female on the Earth. I couldn't disagree. It was just that sort of a scene and all of our spirits were up. Epsilon was turning out to be a lot of fun and when you are the Supreme Reality, having fun and loving all that is is the name of the game. When it came time for my projection to head for the tubes, who should show up at the pod door to escort me but the guru Ji. I couldn't believe it, though I surmised quickly that he had some last minute instructions to deliver. What was also unbelievable was that there wasn't another single soul to be seen anywhere. There was just myself and the Ji. It was a momentarily, lonely kind of atmosphere, if you can believe that. I figured rightly though that he'd told the others to stay away. I was a bit put out at first because it's rather nice to have comrades give you a bit of a send off. Especially when you're about to do Earth for the umpteenth time. I had, I must admit, expected a bit of a crowd, like Shorty got. To tell the truth though, having a dude of the Ji's standing assist one to the tubes beats the absolute hell out of anything. I was soon in ecstasy floating side by side with my favourite guru. His grace was astonishingly real. He knew stuff that I hadn't even yet dreamt about. His eloquence was precision plus. His poise and language was that of a super God. The love and warmth of ten thousand suns pulsated from out of his embodiment. He told me in no uncertain terms that I too was the Supreme Reality and to endure anything to complete Epsilon. Look at the mind that you are attached to from the divine outside and not from the personal inside, was a major part of his advice. He also told me to write the truth as much as I would come to understand it from the self conscious state. He admonished me to pursue cosmic consciousness until my balls dropped off and he gave me the coordinates for the meeting with the Bombay guru. Then, as I toppled into my allocated tube, he gave me a mighty thumbs up.

  "Remember Exane!," he said as I began to fall.

  "You are divine! Your suffering is divine. Your joy is divine. You are the limitless being. You have the most powerful weapon in all of the universes at your disposal. You possess...the inner Self. The sadguru. Seek it out, no matter what the cost. Don't let any bullshit that mortals have conjured up stop you. Never forget! You alone are!"

  All that I felt as I fell was this wonderful love for my favourite guru. As far as I was concerned, he was most definitely the Supreme Reality. He was the limitless being, there was no doubt about that. I trusted him beyond reason. Though I was about to run the gauntlet of physical life in the most difficult training hologram ever invented, I knew that his words would come back to haunt me as insights whilst I was there. For souls like myself, the right advice or insight at the right time in the right place is like finding a spiritual gold nugget the size of the sun in one's psychological backyard. It's amazing too because there is such a time lapse between the exposure to an insight, the acceptance of it and the full realisation of it. I was to notice that fully in this coming life. When I first found out that I wasn't in the body, it took ages for it to really sink in. I used to try and mentally condition myself and kept repeating inwardly, I am not the body, I am not the mind, I am not these thoughts and feelings. I am, that is all. I exist, I love. I love nature because it's natural and nature loves what is natural within me. The nature of being of all that is, I love. Pure awareness spawned me. I am light, the Supreme Reality, the limitless being and so forth. Then invariably, in the course of day to day conversations within I would slip back and refer to my mind, my body and all of the anxiety ridden, worrying junk would return. The self conscious would get me again. The difference was though that I could then say, no! Away with this rubbish. This is false. Both body and mind are transient and therefore they don't belong with the psychic I am, I exist. Then I would just witness the mind from every angle without judging or hassling it. That powerfully solved everything, when I could do it. Of course the I am sensation was false also. It is not the Supreme Reality nor shall it ever be. It merely points out the Tao to the Supreme Reality which is ever ready to flood a purified mind with omnipotent light and is closer than the air that the body breathes. Once I got the hang of the inner being the outer and the outer being the inner though, the fear level started to drop. I can't express in words how glad I was about that. When I first experienced matter as the same omnipotent, everywhere energy, it was a stupendously awesome relief.

 

  "Don't forget the frog business either!," was guru Ji's last message.

  "I won't Master!," I telepathed back.

 

 

 

                                                            EARTH

 

    The Earth hologram, mistaken by so many to be a real, solid world, is a child of love. No matter what is experienced here, the soul treasures it as an exquisite and integral part of its illuminating trajectory towards cosmic consciousness or infinite self knowledge.(Reality) Without the steps which come before the final step which leads to the reclaiming of the grace state, there would be no cosmic consciousness. A soul endowed with cosmic consciousness though is totally aware that this world is not. They know that it is unreal, mind projection, completely transient, illusion and false. A holographic movie on a mindscreen, a virtual reality domain. Because they can slip in and out of the wider consciousness at will, they can afford to make of the Earth a home. Because the Supreme Reality has projected it through them, they indulge it, and because they are the Supreme Reality, they transcend it. Any time that they wish. Basically, the only reason that they hang around is to assist others who are seeking the light.

For the vast bulk of so called humanity though, endowed with self consciousness, this world is a monster prison. Quite often, a prison of stupendously hellish proportions. Trapped in falsely perceived, separated body minds, the vast bulk of humanity struggles endlessly to deal with troubles generated by minds that are identifying solely with the lower, third dimensional self. Over 1000's upon 1000's of years the technology of civilisations change astonishingly whilst the problems of the people living in those civilisations remain exactly the same. Fear, anger, hatred, paranoia and so forth feel exactly the same sitting under an electric light watching the junk on digital TV as they do sitting around a fire in a cave watching shadows on the walls. When the war starts as it inevitably always does, clubs or atom bombs, it's all the same. Whether one dies or 10 million, it's still killing. Until people can conquer the war going on in their own attached minds and elevate themselves out of the infantile self conscious state, it will stay exactly the same. Treaties or agreements will only forestall the start of another war, somewhere or another. The rich will get richer and the poor will get poorer, if they don't get slaughtered first. Only divine karma levels out the deeds score. The justice of man on the planet is superficial nonsense. The inner cannot be transformed or exalted by changes, new ideas, more laws, more policing or different regulations in the illusory outer.

  On the glorious Earth, the psyche can become so distorted and so dominated by animalistic cravings and passions that self gratification and self glorification rule easily over divine instincts. Fears and desires usurp the spirit's love and individuals bounce around between endless pains and short lived pleasures. Personalities and egos run amok and ignorance is the order of the day and night waking state. The result is embroglionic confusion, extreme violence, tremendous suffering or pain and arse about perceptions of the true reality. There is also the tremendous, gut wrenching wish on the part of many to get the hell out of it and go home, although they have absolutely no idea what constitutes home. I am and therefore I appear to think becomes I think and therefore, I am, which is totally and utterly false. The world which is in the true reality an energy vortex inside the spirit body and mind self generated, becomes the solid alien world which is outside the physical body, extremely threatening, hostile and overwhelmingly real in that it requires a struggle of monumental proportions to physically and mentally survive it. Such a perceived world is supposed to be this God or that God generated, though there are many who will happily testify that it is either the work of the Devil or purely an accidental, creatorless creation. Or maybe a bit of both.

  The birth of a child, who is in for a mountain of trouble, is celebrated as something fantastic. The child is worshiped as precious individual life whilst elector sanctioned governments build and maintain weapons that can kill millions. Weapons that can be unleashed in wars backed by imaginary Gods who supposedly don't mind making an enormous profit from a man labelled, justifiable and worthy cause. Which is celebrated endlessly after it has happened and killed millions. Blow the trumpet at dawn and salute the flag and all of that. Meanwhile, the death of one individual is seen as a great misfortune because they have lost their precious life and no longer are, apparently real. Yet that individual is now free of more nonsense than Satan could ever invent and they are usually as happy as larry about that. They are back with their soul and they have more life going for them there than they ever had whilst doing hard time on Earth. If the Earth has a purpose for those spirits who desire or crave sensual expression or sense experiences, it is to awaken entities to discern that which is absolutely real amongst that which is relatively or totally false.

 

  When I re entered it, this crazy fucken energy vortex of a world, I was pumped with the guru's grace. We had chosen Perth,  Australia as our work place and through the astral air I journeyed over the surface of this city. I stopped to check out a certain park that was to play a prominent part in the proceedings and then I headed for the house where my body mum was already in agony. Souls usually spend time with the unborn to get to know the rudimentary intelligence ingested in the small body. The soul comes to complement and expand that which would otherwise not last or not survive physicality. The soul brings intelligence and a whole lot of other stuff into the equation I am, therefore I exist. There is normally a getting to know each other, bonding period. Due to the nature of Epsilon though, I did not have that luxury. Body mum was already screaming her head off when I hurriedly entered the child and introduced myself. The initial reaction from the body wasn't good. Due to my last minute arrival, I could perfectly understand this. However, I didn't have time to mess around so I put my message on the line so that the body knew exactly its position. I just said live or die, your choice.

Actually, this wasn't true because I would have stayed anyway and sorted out any conflict. I was just being sneaky. The body though didn't know this and as to be expected, it chose life. The electrical circuits in its brain fired up and I jumped in there like I was riding the Cannonball Express. I flew into its heart and poured all of the psychic love that I could possibly muster into it. Pretty soon we had a nice, warm, snug thing going. A spirit loves to be welcomed and I was terrestrially stoked by the quickness of the acceptance. He was a cute bugger as babies usually are, however I detected a few future health problems which I had not anticipated from the astral. This time I had no choice, I had to accept them. It didn't matter anyway because I was already madly in love with the little guy. The bug a boogs weren't life threatening, though I knew that  they would frustrate the shit out of me later on. There was a bit of anal stuff there which didn't really turn me on. There's no doubt about it though, to do the Earth properly one has to cultivate an extremely good sense of humour. It may die now and again. If it can be carted all of the way to the death bed though, supreme success is guaranteed.

  "Ahhhhhhhhhhh!," screamed body mum.

  "Push! Push harder!," someone said to her.

  "Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!," went body mum again.

  "I can see the head!," someone else yelled excitedly. "It's coming! It's coming!"

  Well it wasn't too long before I'd popped out and there were celebrations all around. I didn't get smacked on the arse either, which I was thankful for. It was a homebirth and the midwife had spotted me breathing. She placed me on body mum's belly and despite all of the sweat I was quite comfortable there. I could sense two fine nipples above me and that was heavenly. As the babe closed its eyes, I vacated the body to check out the scene. Body dad was hovering close by and he seemed pleased that his partner's pain was over. He gave her a gentle kiss, gave me an affectionate pat on the back and then whispered sweet nothings in her ear. I felt sorry for the lad because I was their first child and he had no idea what he was in for. I knew for a fact that the pitter, patter of little feet was going to turn into his worst nightmare, but he didn't. I must admit though that later on, when it came to hanging my shitty nappies on the fence and hosing them down, he became an expert. I even think that after a while he began to enjoy it. It was a kind of therapy for him.

I buzzed around the house a bit, sized up the back yard and some of the neighbourhood and then shot back into the body. There was something going on which I had detected from two streets away, where was located Shorty's house. I'd intended to pay him a quick visit, though I didn't make it. Body mum's fanny had split a bit and the midwife had rung the doctor to come and stitch her up. I decided that I'd better hang around, besides that I wanted to see the afterbirth come out. There were a few tests that I wanted to run on it. When it did, I did so and it was a relief to discover everything to be in order. I had to laugh though because body dad took it out into the back yard to bury it. On a sudden inspiration though he fed it to the dog. The dog loved it. Body dad didn't tell body mum about it though. I was to find out that he was like that. He had his secrets and it pleased him to keep them to himself.

  Up until I was about three years old, I retained the ability to astrally vacate the body. Shorty and I spent many a wild night together down the local park. The park was called Hyde, probably named after Hyde Park in London. Shorty and I did much research in those days, comparing notes and going over and over our plans. We had massive communications with our insight team and several times guru Ji organised midnight spirit councils. Our plans were refined at these meetings. Working on the notion of telling the pure truth about Epsilon in a book, the plot of the story was discussed in tremendous detail. Everyone had input and sometimes things even became quite heated. Some wanted this in or that out, others wanted this out and that in. It was all a matter of editing so that the story could be presented in a condensed, presentable and readable package. We were all fully aware that humans were into crime, romance, serial murders, cowboys, multiple personalities, sci fi, fantasy, spies, soap operas, war, traditional dramas and those sort of genres. We knew that, because of their tremendous fear of the unknown, that out there stuff alienated some of the general public. We were aware that to break into the mainstream, multinational dominated, highly competitive, money orientated market that we would have to come up with something completely different that captured the ordinary reader's attention. We wanted a book where the reader would feel that the light was jumping out of the pages at them. In a friendly sort of a way, involving a bit of gentle persuasion to wake up and do the right thing by their soul. So that they might prosper on their particular path towards cosmic consciousness. The one thing that was in our favour was that underneath the mainstream reading consciousness there was this phenomenal interest in spiritual stuff. That was only natural considering the origins of the picture people of the planet.

The truth is good shit and it has to be exposed sooner or later. Cosmic consciousness ends the insane suffering of continual mental questioning, self consciousness endlessly regurgitates it. Stopping the mind from thinking is like trying to stop the body from excreting. Only deep meditation can do it. Even so, we still estimated that the odds for Epsilon weren't that favourable. We knew that 1000's upon 1000's of unsolicited manuscripts are rejected. Still, everyone was of the opinion that the show must go on. Besides that, we had absolutely nothing to lose. We weren't in it for the money and after a while it became clear to us that we weren't in it to educate anyone either. Under guru Ji's tutelage it dawned on us all that we were doing it for the fun of it and to entertain. After all, of what use is a big bar of chocolate by the bedside table when one is dreaming that they are dying of starvation? That is to say that Earth is an imaginary dreamworld of a battlefield and in the true reality, nothing happens in it. This may be incredibly difficult for mortals who live inside their attached minds to understand, because through the mind they imagine that what is happening to them and around them is real. Deadly serious solid stuff and all of that. It takes a specialist to develop the awareness that what is seen is nothing more than the collusion of the projections of one's own attached mind with the vortex of consensus reality. It also takes a rare sort of genius to acknowledge that the spirit orchestrates the projections to further the development of cosmic consciousness. The good, the bad, the ugly, the joyful highs, the suffering and the pain are all in the pictures on the mind screen. They are not in the light that is allowing the projections to happen. The soul's real essence is in the light too, it is no where near the unreal pictures. The whole set up is a holographic masterpiece displaying the sheer brilliance and unlimited genius of the mind as a spiritual tool. The same mind that enslaves also liberates, thus highlighting the duality inherent in third dimensional training programmes.

 

 

  By the time that I was into my 4th year, the story that I was supposed to write was virtually stored in the cells of my attached body. It was locked into the brain like a solid chunk of the reality of light.  There were a few other scripts in there as well. Ones that would lead me to Epsilon. They would all be rejected by the dudes who run the mainstream publishing industry, but that didn't bother my spirit. It was Epsilon that I was after. The others would just be warm ups. Loveable warm ups, but never the less, just warm ups. It was also around this time that Shorty and I became locked into the fields surrounding our bodies. Our conscious astral travelling days ceased and although we used to meet in the dream state, we did not recognise each other. The dreams were organised by our insight council. They were just fooling around with us really. The fuckers had had so much midnight fun frolicking in the park that they just couldn't give the scene up. They were also training themselves for later on, I will give them that.

  Interestingly enough, it was the park where Shorty and I first met in the physical. It was a balmy Wednesday afternoon and our respective body mums had taken us down there to get some relief from their domestic situations. Mainly us driving them nuts. They were pushing their number 2's in their respective prams and Shorty and I were riding our wee, three wheeler bikes. The mamas were originally walking in opposite directions. Our body mums looked absolutely lovely this day. They both had floral patterns on their ankle length, free flowing, loose fitting skirts. They were so young, so pretty, so vibrant, so breasty and so alive. A kind of sexual maternalness was radiating ooze like from the very pores of their embodiment. I knew it because the lonely guys that passed them by both envied and wanted them. They didn't want us though.

 When I first came across the scrawny little runt of a redhead Shorty, he was standing beside his overturned machine.

  "Bike dead!," I heard him say to his body mum.

  "Oh Max! C'mon, pick it up," she said to him.

  "Bike dead!," he repeated.

I pulled up alongside of him and evaluated the scene. He stared at me and I stared at him. Our mums smiled at each other. They started up a conversation though I didn't catch what they said.

  "Bike no dead!," I told the stranger. This was clearly the truth as far as I could tell.

Shorty looked at his machine again, questioningly.

  "No dead?," he asked me.

I shook my head as I answered.

  "No dead. Bike sleep!"

The little guy looked again at his tricycle and a look of sheer indignation crossed his youthful face.

  "Slee...eep?," he roared.

I nodded yes. The next thing that happened was that Shorty leant back and gave the bike one hell of a boot. It skidded a bit across the path and some paint peeled off one of the rear wheel guards.

  "Wake up y'fucker!," he yelled at it.

  "Oh Max!," his body mum exploded.

  "How many times do I have to tell you not to use that word!?"

She leant over and picked the bike up, he jumped on and we took off in the same direction. My body mum turned her pram around and thus their friendship started up as well. It was to last longer in the physical than ours. During the course of their dialogue that day, they naturally discussed us.

  "Max has this thing for cats," I heard his body mum say later on.

  "He collects them. Ever since he could walk, he's had this thing for them. He treats them so gently that it simply amazes Bill and I. He's so rough normally but around cats, especially kittens, he's like a little angel."

  "Exane's thing is frogs," my body mum told her.

  "He's the same. He collects them and hoards them in his room. It drives me nuts because I keep on thinking that he's going to end up covered in warts."

  "Quack!...Quack!...Quack!," a duck on one of the lakes went, sounding like it was laughing its head off.

  Shorty and I meanwhile had come up with a neat game running over all of the duckshit on the path. Some of the sloppy little piles, we stopped at and rolled our front wheels over, back and forth like. If we went fast enough the shit flicked up onto the underneath of the mudguard and dripped back down onto the wheel. I reckon that every duck in the park must have had the runs. That wasn't surprising because there were numerous signs warning humans to keep clear of the water. There was a word on them that explained why but I couldn't make head nor tails of it. We got away with our game for a while though because our body mums were happily conversing. Then they noticed what we were doing.

  "Boys! Boys!," they yelled.

  "Stop that!"

We took off again and roared down the path. It was like a huge tunnel for us because there were trees close to the lakes and also on the other side of the path. Their branches overhung both ways and the mingling of the profuse, green foliage created a magnificent effect. As with much of nature, the holographics were superb magic. That park was to play such a prominent part in both of our lives that it's staggering really. We used to haunt it. By the time that we were both seven years old, we practically lived there. There wasn't the phobia about kids being out on their own in those days. We used to, when we weren't at the concentration camp called school, roam the neighbourhood. We'd have breakfast, meet up and hit the park. Back then it had little jetties and small, long necked tortoises. They were great to watch swimming around. I never saw a seagull either. They moved in later when they cottoned on that they could get a free feed down there. I suppose the buggers flew over from the WACA (the cricket ground) on their way back to the beach. Noisy, squawking bloody things they are too. Interesting to look at close up with their dotted eyes, though most times they'll out hassle the ducks for any scrap of bread that the humans throw out. Birds have weird pecking orders. There are signs in the park to not feed them because they live naturally on what the lakes provide. The humans take no notice though. I've seen people go there with garbage bags full of old bread. To call such types turkeys would be to insult the beautiful turkeys of the holographic planet Earth.

  There was an incident later on that night at Shorty's joint which went like this.

Number 2, the babe, had just been breast fed and put back into the cot. It was almost midnight. His body mum got back into bed and snuggled up close to her old man. She was on her side with her back to him. He sensed immediately what was going on as she bum pressed his groin. They hadn't been able to have it off all week because the kid was teething. Eagerly, he responded to her pressure. His hands came up and rolled her nightie up.

Meoww!...Meoww!...Meoww!, came a noise from Shorty's room.

Meoww!"

  "Wahhhhh!," went the now awakened kid.

  "Oh! For Christ's sake!," roared Shorty's body dad.

  "Not again!"

  "Now Bill, keep cool! We'll get back to it," said body mum as she went to fetch the bawling number 2.

Body dad meanwhile, huffily entered Shorty's room.

  "Shorty! How many damn times do I have to tell you not to bring these bloody cats into your room at night!"

Shorty though was fast asleep. He didn't hear a thing. Body dad ended up belly down on the floor trying to grab a frightened kitten that had taken refuge way underneath my mate's bed.

  "Come here you little bugger!," he roared whilst swishing madly at the terrified, wee creature.

Eventually, after crawling all of the way under the bed, he grabbed it. On his way outside, he heard his wife giggling away like a schoolgirl. By the time that he made it out into the backyard, he was laughing himself. Rejecting the urge to boot the pussy over the fence, he put it down and gently released it. It took off like a bullet.

  At my place, it was a different story.

Croak!...Croak!...Croak!...that was the noise that disturbed the parent's peace.

Body dad wasn't so gentle either.

  "Go and hump a toad!," he roared at one of my pet frogs as he rudely dispatched it over the back fence.

  "Go and sit on y'mother's face!," he told another one as it sailed after the first one.

  "Go and kiss the Prime Minister's dick!," he told the third one.

  "Motherfucking croaker!," he said to the fourth.

When I got up the next morning and found my shoebox full of guests deadset empty, did I ever give him shit. I kicked him in the shins and carried on like a warrior until I was out of the door searching for my good pals. I found one of them in the back lane too. Basil, I called him. He was dirty and somewhat shaken but otherwise he was ok. I went down to see Shorty who was moody because he'd lost his pussy. Frankly, that was to be the story of Shorty's life...and mine too. Together though, we searched for the little fella. Later on in our lives, when we realised the dream nature of Earth and the holographic essences of bodies, we had no regrets about anything or anybody that we thought that we'd lost. It took some getting to that stage though.

  The first day that Shorty and I spent at kindergarten was a riot that we were 100% responsible for. It was after lunch and the other toddlers had gone back inside the main activity room. The building was virtually out in the bush in an area that would later become a densely populated northern suburb of the most isolated city on Earth. My mate and I hung back from the group when they went back inside. The pretty young teacher and her assistant didn't initially notice our absence. They soon would though. We had spotted something rather interesting during our lunchtime explorations and it was conveniently located right outside an opened window of the play room. It was a pile of horseshit about 4 feet high and 6 feet round. Shorty and I had never seen so much shit. It was magic dung as far as we were concerned. Without further delay we made an instantaneous psychic decision to give vent to our early feelings towards institutionalised schooling. Mainly, we were protesting about being locked up. Their plasticine was good quality but after about half an hour of messing around with it, we were bored. Cutting out and colouring in was a drag man. We desired stuff with real sustenance to it. Roaming the neighbourhood exploring for ourselves was much more fun. I reckon that we'd heaved half of that pile of shit into the playroom before they got hold of us.     Even then they had to restrain our arms It was raining dung in there and the squeals and screams only served to make us work faster.

Of course we got shat on and had to spend the rest of the day with our noses pointed towards opposite corners of the room. We got crapped on at home too. Later on that night though, when I was snug in bed, I heard my body dad having a good laugh about it. I don't think, being a labourer, that he thought much of school either. Who, if they are deeply honest with themselves, really does? If only they taught something that a soul could really use, like meditation or witnessing or how the limited mind of the body self wrongly identifies itself with holographic pictures, it might be different. School was jail to me and then society became a prison and then Earth became a jail.

  Shorty and I had pretty ordinary growing up experiences. We did our prison time in primary school and high school and then we left wondering what in the hell we were going to do with ourselves. Aside from chasing girls and taking drugs, that is. The both of us tried university. I even completed a degree. Shorty enrolled for three different courses three years in a row. The longest he lasted was about 6 weeks. The bugger spent his entire time sitting in the library reading a book called Cosmic Consciousness, by one Richard Bucke. Bucke had a monstrous beard that any bikie would have been mighty proud of. He lived around the 1900's and was head of some asylum in Canada. His theory was that Jesus, Buddha and thirty odd others throughout history, including some women, had had this cosmic consciousness. He reasoned that cc (cosmic consciousness) or awareness of the entire universe and beyond as one's psychic body, was dormant within the human. It was, he claimed, very slowly increasing in a natural progression from self consciousness. Shorty used to come out of that library with stars in his eyes.

At lunchtime we'd go down to the carpark and sit in the car and smoke a joint. He'd rave about cc and to begin with I thought that he'd gone mad. I mean, how can a human who is lucky to see further than their nose, comprehend and be aware of an infinitely expanding universe? It just didn't make sense. Slowly though the stuff that he was mouthing off about began to awaken me. If you think it out deeply, anything that you can perceive or conceive cannot be your real self. How can it if you are perceiving or conceiving it from some other point?

I had always realised this heightened intelligence in the Shorty lad and I figured rightly that he was onto something. What he said then about cc opened me up and I started exploring for myself. I looked at the book and got hold of another one called On The Taboo Of Knowing Who You Are by Alan Watts. After that, books and other stuff dealing with cc just kept appearing in my path. This is the synchronicity stuff that is talked about in The Celestine Prophecy. Of course, Shorty was also just doing his job by firing me up, according to what he and I and the others had 4th dimensionally planned. He was damn convincing though. He had to be or I never would have started writing the stories which culminated in my describing Epsilon. Every individual's life on this planet is an Epsilon, if only they knew it.

  We did a lot of acid or LSD in the late 60's early 70's. I think that I'm still getting over it. Shorty had flashbacks for years afterwards and I was still getting the odd occasional taste of the chalky form of the stuff a decade or so later. It used to appear at the back of my throat suddenly and make me quiver and shudder. We used to drop them around 9 in the evening and head for the hippies wine bar up the top end of Hay street. When the bar shut, we'd take a short walk back towards inner Perth. There was an underground coffee shop just down the road. It was neat. Snugglepots it was called. They'd strung opened up parachutes across the ceilings and it was like being on the inside of a body cell. All of the freaks used to hang out there until the cops shut it down. We'd play chess, drink coffee and maybe, if we could manage it, get some cinnamon toast down our throats. I used to feel like I was actually down on the board marshalling my pieces. Shorty always beat me though, the prick. Around 2 or 3 in the morning, we'd drive down to City Beach to check out the ocean. After that, we'd go up to King's Park and wait for the dawn. From our high up position, we used to play a game spotting the first car to crawl out along the freeway. You'd think that having the roads to themselves that they would have been motoring. They were on their way to work though so they usually took their time winding up to slavery speed. Before the morning traffic became too heavy, we'd go home to our rented joint, have a shower and go to bed. We did that every second or third night for about three to six months. The acid certainly made us aware that there is more than one reality available to man and woman. It's not a method that I suggest or recommend though. It's too much of a blitz on the mind. Besides, meditation is far more powerful and a lot safer. It's also a hell of a lot cheaper.

  So the years went, drifting from one pub to another, spotting the girls and listening to the deafening bands. Job here, job there and inbetween the study of nothing. Girl here, girl there, comings and goings and many philosophical discussions about what life was all about. Vietnam was on but it didn't stop us having a joint here or a joint there. Then we spent some years apart. I went east with a girl and Shorty went north with one. Years later we met up again in the old city. He had a different girl and so did I. His girl was an Asian beauty called Lu Mi and my love was an Australian lass by the name of Becky. The girls hit it off right from the start. Shorty hadn't changed much. He was still at me all of the time about writing. I had actually done one or two scripts which were rejected by everyone but God. I used to tell him that they took too long to do and that no fucker was interested in them anyway. He'd keep at me though. In fact, all of the way across the states he wouldn't shut up about it. It used to drive me nuts. We'd raised the money for the trip doing some pretty horrible jobs. The girls waitressed and Shorty and I were in a contract team that cleaned chook farms. Even deep into the heart of the good, old USA we were still blowing chook feathers out of our noses. With some of the jobs on this holographic planet, it's no wonder that some beings turn to Satan's piss for a bit of relief.

  We bought a couple of vans in California and headed for the dead centre of the most materially powerful nation on Earth. I remember this incident that happened one day, although I can't recall where we were. It had been raining gently over this paradise of a lush green countryside and we'd pulled up by the side of a 4 lane highway for lunch. There was a pull off place there with wooden tables and bins and stuff. It was a very scenic spot. The girls were knocking up some sandwiches when Shorty spotted a cat headed for the road. At the same time, I spied numerous of my frog brothers headed in the same direction as the puss. The rain had flushed them out and they were all intent on doing the why did the chicken cross the road thing. The girls had their heads down when they heard the screech of breaks and the honking of numerous big horns. They looked up to see cars and trucks going everywhere and Shorty and myself in the middle of the highway. I know that Americans speak English but I couldn't recognise half of what some of those drivers said to us. Jesus, they were mad. Neither, above the noise and abuse could we make out what Lu Mi and Beck were screaming out at us. I did pick up (expletive) idiots, but that was about it.

Shorty eventually got across to the other side of the highway with his new found pussy friend in his arms. He put the cat down and the stupid thing started to cross the road back the way that we'd come. I was distraught because so many of my frog brothers were being squashed to death, although I had about ten in my arms that I let hop towards freedom. They took off like Mexican jumping beans in that direction. By the time that we made it back to the vans, the girls were hysterical. They abused us solid for about half an hour and then refused to speak to either of us for the next day. I think that they were upset because if we'd been cleaned up then they would have had to drive, for once. Most likely with out bloodied, mangled corpses in the back. Shorty and Lu Mi had a hell of an argument over whether or not the cat could travel with them. At one stage he asked Becky if it could ride with us and she just about snotted him. As much as I wanted to give some of my frog brothers a free trip into the next state, I couldn't tempt fate. Even when were splitting up later on, the Beck was never as wild as she got this day. With her red hair flaming from her head, she looked astonishingly beautiful as she yelled bloody blue murder at me. Shorty and I slept in one van that night and the girls in the other. Maybe that's when they started getting it on or maybe it was earlier on, I don't really know. To make matters worse, the cat pissed on my sleeping bag and my frog brothers kept Shorty awake all night. So, we almost came to blows as well. Fortunately, a very kind lady at the next gas station promised to look after the cat and my frog friends disappeared back into the Earth from whence they had come. It was a wild few days though and so was the sex which settled the psychic dust of that experience. Sex is like that. It usually satisfies the urges of the body and calms the restless mind so that it can enjoy deep sleep. So long as the body orgasms, that is.

  Back in Oz, we all got married. Both of the girls were with child and we had to calm our respective folks down somehow. We took rented houses within walking distance of each other and Shorty and I got full time jobs. We became orderlies at the same hospital and we saw a lot of death. It was pretty shocking at first, though we became used to it. We were still smoking dope, though by this time we were looking at the Indian guru stuff and toying with meditation. It wasn't easy after our first kids were born to find the peace and quiet for inner searching. It was a bit of a struggle, as everything in the early family years usually is. Beck's and mine first body son had colic and he screamed his guts out for the first three months. It was a tense time. It was even a relief to get outside with the shitty nappies and blast the shit off them with the hose. The girls spent a lot of time with each other and that continued after the number 2's entered this holographic, mind produced world. Life sauntered along. I tried to finish off my teaching studies which I'd started so many years before, but I couldn't hack it. Some of Bob Dylan's lyrics about the mongrel dogs who teach used to go through the mind that I was attached to too much. Considering also what I thought about schooling being prison, I just didn't have it in me to stand in front of kids and pretend that I knew anything that was worth passing on.

  Through all of these years, Shorty kept at me about the writing. I did a couple more, though nothing happened. I couldn't understand it either. They seemed ok to me. They were just yarns about some of the saucer folk and Earth's holographics. In the end, I self published one. It didn't work either and it crippled me financially. No one seemed interested in my stuff and I got pretty down about it. Shorty was there though. Raving about it all being normal for writers, that they have to do lots of scripts before they make it. Keep going, he used to say to me. Just keep plugging away at it and eventually you'll get one that's accepted. I used to counter him by saying that they'd never accept my genre. I was too far out for them. What was the point? I can't do murder or spies or horror or romance or any of that dreamland stuff, I'd tell him. I'm only interested in the truth in fiction form, I'd say. The Shorty would shake his head though and keep repeating his message. Then he'd feed me all of this stuff that he'd been reading. He had the knack for devouring spiritual books. God, the stuff that he used to come out with. Things like, the Andromedans told so and so when they abducted him that the universe is a 23 trillion year old hologram. When you make the inner the outer, then you shall enter the kingdom of Heaven, was another one. Space and time are in you, not outside, another. The world that you think that you are seeing is your own mind. It's pure projection, yet another. The lad was like the rivet that held the ship together during that time. I had hit a space of deterioration. I knew that something was up with me and Beck and the mental turmoil and questioning that had plagued me ever since I could think was getting out of hand. To tell the truth, there were many times when I just wanted to die. I could make no more sense of the inner than I could of the outer and in a way I despised them both. Shorty was my confidant, even more so when he realised that something was up with his beloved Lu Mi. When we came home unexpectedly one day to my joint and found them in bed together, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Neither did he. It was like we'd walked onto the set of some dumb soap opera, or something. It just seemed unreal and then everything began to feel unreal. Which, strangely enough, is the way holograms are supposed to feel. Only, we didn't know that at this stage. We did later though and then we realised that it was all a set up of a staged show and there was absolutely nothing to worry about. When the girls told us that they wanted to take the kids and live together, it got deadly. We kicked and screamed, fought and almost brawled a couple of times, but we lost. We didn't have a chance really, not against the formidable power of the decision made, pussy. They'd been lovers for years.

  We moved from the homes that we'd built up and took a couple of flats in the same block. Night after night with a bottle or two of spirits separating us, we tried to make sense of their treachery. We couldn't though. Shorty got really down and so did I. We'd drag ourselves to work, though our hearts weren't in it. We went to a few bars, kind of looking for women. Our hearts weren't in it though. The girls were pretty, but much younger than us. We felt like a couple of old farts, heads drooped over our drinks, scowls on our faces. Even the whores in nearby streets who bummed fags off us couldn't get us going. They'd try to chat us up but would soon realise that we were so depressed that we weren't worth worrying about. About the only thing that did interest us was going down to the park that we had known so well in our childhoods. We had purposely chosen to live near there and whenever we had the kids, it was usually there that we took them. In the late afternoons, we'd stroll around and around the lakes. Sometimes we'd hardly say anything. It just felt good to walk and to be in our beloved park. I thought of suicide a lot then. The confusion in me was astronomical and the mind that I was attached to was doing all of this crazy stuff that I didn't want it to do. I was screaming at it sometimes to stop and leave me alone, yet it wouldn't. It just went on and on and on and on and if a fly happened to shit in front of me, my attached mind would worry itself sick about it. Then, when it stopped worrying about that, it would start worrying about something else. I worried about the past, I worried about the future. The present, even though I didn't feel as if I was located in it, was an abyss full of watery bowel actions. Fear and anger flowed from every orifice that I possessed, like steam. I started getting anxiety and panic attacks over the slightest things. God, I was a mess. Satan was doing a war dance in my head. The bastard, having gunned my Jesus side down, thought that he had me. So did I. I could not see the light at the end of the tunnel, I couldn't even see the tunnel. I was buried deep in the underworld called Hades. A  new born baboon had more confidence than I did then. My insecurity level skyrocketed to such a degree that I started nervously shaking whenever I farted. Passing wind scared me that much. I was desperate to get to the bottom of the despair so that I could touch the spirit and start on the upward path again. I felt decidedly unlovable and was convinced that nothing that I knew was of any value to anybody or anything. It wasn't just the split with Beck that was causing my nervous breakdown. It was life. It was the way that I had allowed my personality to lead me astray from my spirit. I had chased all of the illusions, food, sex, drugs, the outer entertainments, material possessions, money, fame and so forth and neglected to fathom that it was the spirit self who was really in control. Now the spirit self was giving me a right old shake up whilst it prepared me to do what it wanted me to do. That was Epsilon. I talked with my mate about the hangman's noose, but he just laughed.

  "Ah suicide! Fuck that!," the Shorty scoffed, half jokingly.

  "You can kill the body but the mental turmoil will remain. Our souls are doing this with us, let's just ride it out. Enjoy mate, enjoy! It's transient, it'll pass. We're free of those dirty, bellyaching bitches. At last! We loved and we lost, so what? Isn't that the story of most of the human race?"

  "Fuck the fucken soul!," I think that I replied to his optimism.

  "I just want to go home! I can't take this shit anymore. No one wants my fucken books and no one wants me. I just can't figure anything out like I used to be able to do. I've had this fucken hell hole! You just go around in circles in this mad fucken place." That's what I told my right arm.

  There were other days when I was slightly up and Shorty was terribly down and suicidal. He missed his Asian princess something shocking. So we swapped roles. He would reel out the negatives and I would counter with what positives I could muster. We had a favourite perving seat at one end of the park where we would sit for hours checking out the girls and ducks. We were trying to decide which form was the more appealing to blokes like us. The lake scenario was very peaceful. The aura of the still water, overhanging tree foliage and floating birds at times mesmerised us. The shadows and the play of light there was timeless. It was the high point of summer and around 6 to 7 pm was the best time. The half hour after 7 wasn't too bad either. Many of the girls that we saw there would be walking their dogs. Some of their dogs were bigger than they were and it was quite a trial for them to clean up their pet's shit. Especially when they were a fair distance away from one of the park's bins where the yellow, plastic crapping bags were located. We watched a few of them lug a few piles half away around the park. Shorty reckoned that if he had another dog that he'd shove a cork up its ass before he took it out. Some of the younger women got around on roller skates. The athletic types would come roaring by, either power walking or running. Their boobs would be bouncing all over the place and Shorty and I particularly enjoyed that, for some reason. We came to the conclusion that women who wear short tops so that their belly buttons are visible do so so that other beings can see where they used to be connected to their mothers.

The ones that dressed in black with pointed hair and rings dangling from everywhere were sometimes quite frightening. Dracula's cousins, Shorty called them. He was very fond of their red lipstick though and secretly, I think that they really turned him on. He just wouldn't admit it because he was stuck with the hippy image of long flowing hair, flowers and loose, long dresses. There were also the odd ones with low cut tops and if they bent forward anywhere in our vicinity we'd just about go apeshit. We strained ourselves to the limits of creation to see them as oval shaped souls in an etheric sea of consciousness. The Supreme Reality in human form. Sometimes we won and sometimes we lost. At other times we had long conversations with each other and God regarding the advantages of incarnating in the male form. It was so much easier to piss, less chance of picking up the crabs from public toilets, less chance of becoming top heavy and easier to break free of the I am the body idea. The lad and I knew that we had lost our youthful looks. We knew that age was already crucifying us. We knew that we were ugly. What was the point of denying it? What was the point of us trying to pretty ourselves up? If the hearse had have pulled up behind us then with our coffins in the back, we would have jumped into them and told the driver to drive on. No questions asked. The cemetery James and don't spare the horses, that's what we would have said. Or groaned.

  Whilst all of this was going on, we were still discussing metaphysical issues. He had obtained from somewhere some tapes about different dimensional states within consciousness and we listened to those quite a lot. Basically they stressed that reality is a mind derived state and not a set, objective entity. From the same source he got hold of more tapes dealing with the soul and we thrashed those as well. The soul is the accumulated experiences of a spirit throughout time, space and dimension, they asserted. We loved that sort of shit. Our insights into the truth were building slowly, although we still had bad days when we really missed our girls and kids. Then one day we went across the road from our beloved park and strolled into an inconspicuous building which we had never before noticed and which housed the Theosophical Society. There was a bookshop and library there. To us, it was like finding Ali Baba's cave. It was a virtual treasure house of our sort of stuff. Shorty bought a book called I Am That. It was full of the translated recordings of taped meetings between spiritual seekers from both the east and west with a little known Indian guru type. According to the cover of the book he was a saint and he soon became a lot more than that to us. This was the book which really kick started the final drive towards Epsilon. It was uncanny the way he just pulled it from out of the shelf. Like it had been put there for us to find. At 3am the next morning he was pounding excitedly on my door. When I opened it he was standing there with an enormous, rapturous smile on his face, affectionately patting the book which was in his right hand, with his left hand. I had not seen him so happy since the days when he used to get his regular nightly rut with Lu Mi. He burst in like the Tasmanian devil and started raving to me about the book. We had coffee and for three solid hours, he jawed. I was utterly fascinated with the information and later that day, after work, I purchased my own copy. Shorty was right as usual, we had struck pure gold. Rejected bums and social nothings that we were, we had struck paydirt. I reckon that if Satan had showed up then and offered us a trillion dollars each if we went back in time and missed finding this book, we would have told him to fuck off. Without blinking, we would have told the Horned One where to stick his imaginary horns. When you find your guru, whatever form the guru takes, it's pure bliss.

  We began a serious study of I Am That, we could not ignore it. It opened us right up. We started meditating again and finally kicked the green weed, knowing that it would retard our progress towards realisation. For months we pondered over the Master's words and explored our I am sides. We came to understand that the only truthful statement that one can make is, I am. Before the world, before God, before thought or identification with anything known, there is I am, I exist, I love. By no means within eternity can this I am be changed into I am not. The I am loomed before us as the door into the unknown. Our days became exciting again, we sort of forgot about our lost loves. In the odd moment, we even worked out that they had only gone along with some sort of plan that we had ourselves drawn up. The Shorty and I began to explore again, just like we'd done when we were kids. Fun entered our psyches once more.

We also started to remember our dreams again and spent many hours discussing them. Nightmares hit us as well. I had some doozies in which I fell into enormous holes or was in the vicinity when innocent children were brutally clubbed to death. Shorty had a recurring one about being chased by a sea snake through the inner city. For about 3 weeks, I couldn't get him to go into town. I went myself one day. Although we had decided that we didn't need any more books, I pulled one off a shelf in a secondhand shop and brought it home. It was all about the journey of the soul and consisted of interviews done with people under hypnosis. They talked about past lives, about dying and being born again. They also discussed what they did on the other side. By this time Shorty and I knew from I Am That that we had never, in Reality been born, nor would we ever die. This is a fact for all souls, whether they are in a gross world, subtle or mental one. You only dream or imagine that you're not home, blissfully safe with the Supreme. We still read and enjoyed the secondhand book though. I hadn't written in a long time and it gave me ideas for another story. I discussed these ideas with my mate and he suggested that I call the book Epsilon. When I asked him why, he replied why not? I couldn't argue with that.

  We started to frequent the main library on the edge of town. There we explored their section on Hindu mythology and so forth. We wanted to know more about the guru tradition and India in general. Our guru was dead, but he had left us his book and it had blown our minds like nothing we had previously come into contact with. The fact that he was almost totally uneducated vindicated our impressions of modern schooling as being practically worthless in preparing people for spiritual advancement. Our guru was also poor all of his life. He never owned a phone or a car nor did he ever have a backyard in which to dig a big hole in which to plant a swimming pool. He never worried about losing his material possessions because he didn't have any. He didn't want any. He had Realised, having obeyed his guru by attuning himself to the only thing that was real in his existence, the sense of I am. Not I am this or that, but just I Am. I exist, I love. I am pure being. I am beyond the body mind, I am beyond consciousness. He also did some meditations early on. In 3 years he did what takes some souls millions of years and thousands upon thousands of lifetimes to do. He blew his mind away and became the Real. He was the richest man on Earth because he had experienced the Supreme Reality as being himself and he was fully conscious when inside consciousness that Earth was an imaginary dreamworld. Unreal to its core and holographic throughout its entire essence. A picture world of the reflected shadows of the Source of souls. Having no more substance to it than any dream has during the mortal sleeping state. He had cosmic consciousness, that innate awareness of the unlimited Nameless One that is common to and in all of us. In our hearts it burns as the light that can never be extinguished. Our guru was and still is the limitless being.

Most of the beings who came to him for counsel were working class Indians, though obviously from the dialogues in his book, westerners came to visit him as well. He charged nobody and he wanted nothing from anybody. Not even God. He had gone beyond God. He did not judge anybody, he treated everybody as being a potential carrier of cosmic consciousness. He saw himself in all beings and his sole concern was with waking others up so that they might liberate themselves from their illusory sufferings. Mind, he stated over and over again, must recognise itself as an agent or tool of timeless being and the self, via the mind, must cease identifying with its own projections. Particularly that of being just one physical, separate body, which is totally false and the cause of immense sufferings. When one looks at a painting or picture of masses of people, can any one individual be truly said to be separate from any other individual? He urged the employment of the witness state, to remain detached or aloof from the contortions of the body mind and personality and shift power to the I am witness, spirit self. To merely watch the show and let that mysterious power in the universe which pulls the seed out of the Earth and enables it to grow and be coloured, run things. He had the heart of an infinity of universes and the shrewd humour of the Supreme. His use of words and speech were unbelievable and eloquence personified. Shorty and I cut out one of the pictures of him that were in the book and stuck them on our respective walls. We did not bow or prostrate in front of the pictures. We did not get emotional about having him on our walls. Every time that we looked at his picture we would just take a moment to ponder the insights that he had given us. We positioned him in our hearts and we loved him there as one loves an elder, caring brother. Then one day after work when we were sitting at Shorty's kitchen table, we happened to simultaneously glance at our guru's divine face. He told us something then, through the air. He told us to go to India.

  "Why?," we asked.

  "Why not?," he replied, through the air.

When the guru speaks to one from beyond the grave, it is best to do what one is told to do.

 

 

 

                                                                    *

 

 

 

  By now word had got around the joint where the crack ups went that Adam was reading the script from the west that was written by some dude who supposedly knew something about crack ups. The others in the joint had been watching Adam and observing him as he flicked the pages. Everybody was attempting to gauge his interest level in whatever it was that he was reading in an attempt to ascertain whether it would be worth their while to read it also. They had noticed that a couple of times that he had shaken his head in seeming disbelief. He had also laughed a couple of times and once or twice he had scratched his head. This indicated to them that he either had an itchy scalp or that he was straining to understand something, or both.

  "What's it all about Adam?," someone said to the reader as they walked by him.

Adam looked up as he dragged another death stick from its neatly, packaged, multinational, globalised packet.

  "It's...it's...it's," he mumbled as he tried to think of how to describe what he'd been reading.

  "It's crazy! It's all about the soul and these characters who come to Earth to let out some secret information."

  "Oh yeah!," the other dude exclaimed as he stopped for conversation.

  "Secret information business, ay! What sort of information then?"

  "Have you ever considered that you might be the limitless being?," Adam questioned him.

  "No mate, and for a very good reason too. I'm the limited being."

  "No you're not!"

  "I bloody well am!"

The other bloke came up to the reader and showed him the scars on his wrists that were the result of an attempted suicide.

  "See them mate!," he said.

  "They prove how limited I am."

  "They prove nothing!," Adam retorted.

  "They're just marks on a body and it's not your body anyway."

The dude was momentarily stunned.

  "Well whose (expletive) body is it then?," he asked.

  "It's a dream body," Adam told him.

Once again the other bloke looked a bit confused.

  "Yeah! Right mate," he uttered as he walked off.

  "I'm (expletive) dreaming that I'm in a dream body. It's what I've always suspected. This (expletive) planet's nothing but a big (expletive) dream!"

  "You said it Charlie!," Adam commented as he returned to the script. Smoke drifted lazily from the tip of his fag as he did so.

 

 

 

                                                                        *

 

 

 

  Carol shook her head. The plot was thicker than she'd expected. So far there had been no grisly murders or autopsies, no shoot outs, no sex scenes, no romance, no crime scenes, no political corruption, no flying saucers and no aliens. She had to admit though that despite the technical stuff, she was interested. If the truth be known, Carol had a little secret. Being a woman, deep down, she had always nursed the inkling that she might be the Supreme Reality, in disguise. It pleased her to read something that seemed to back up those hidden feelings. It pleased her to know that far from being just a wave that lived temporarily on top of the ocean, that she was the ocean that had projected her as a wave and all of the other waves as well. That exquisite feeling within her that she was sentient existence, the I am, was beginning to strengthen. Her former blues, dark clouds which had blotted out the sun, were beginning to dissolve. The yin and the yang were playing tennis inside of her again. The score was love all, as usual.

 

 

 

                                                                         *

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                INDIA

 

 

  "There’s a (expletive) big hole in the (expletive) runway!," Shorty roared as the jet came in to land at the old Bombay, now Mumbai airport.

  "Where?," I asked him, straining to see out of the tiny window.

There was that screech of the wheels as the plane touched down. A whole bunch of passengers in the surrounding vicinity were eyeing off Shorty as though he was mad, or on drugs. Or both. His outburst had frightened me and by the looks on their faces, I think that he had done the same to them. A hole in the runway is serious business. Some of them looked terrified. We certainly were on the bus ride to the area that we had picked out to stay in. We felt like we'd just arrived in Hades, rather than having just left it. West or east, the shocks are massive in these accelerated times. The joint was massive and it was like nothing that we had ever seen before. It wasn't just cultural shock either, there was something else. As though our souls had been torn from our bodies and roasted over a campfire. Maybe we were being born again, I don't know. Right outside the airport door there was a slum and on the entire way to the area where we were headed, the conditions that the people were living under bemused us. Everything looked so old, so used, so run down. As if the entire place was terminally ill or had recently been nuked. It was a modern miracle that anything could stay alive in such a place, we thought. Alighting from the bus at our destination, 500 odd dudes confronted us yelling out helter skelter like that we should stay here, or there. Some of them had cards and they flashed them in our faces. It was pandemonium and a real struggle to get our gear and escape the babbling throng of hawkers and accommodation pushers. On the short walk to the hotel that we had chosen we got propositioned with just about everything apart from an audience with Satan and a thorough, excellently performed, first class, bum wiping. Such offers we fully expected to encounter later on, given the magnitude of what we had experienced within 15 minutes of stepping off the bus.

They wanted to fix our shoes, clean our ears, give us a massage, sell us hash or brown sugar to inject, provide us with girls or whatever, give them money and so forth and so forth. To make matters worse, my travelling companion almost walked into the back of a cow that was about to unload a massive crap. He was keeping his head down and focusing on the ground thinking that the crowds might just go away. Luckily, after a hoi from me, he looked up at the last moment and executed a sidestep that probably saved his life. The bovine was big and humped and I for one wouldn't have liked to have copped a blast from such an arse. Not at the height that he was at. As it was, the bottom of his dacks copped a splattering and for one brief moment I really thought that he was going to explode. Cool as a cucumber though, with our guru's insights firmly implanted in his brain, ignoring the raucous laughter of many an Indian, he marched solemnly on. I was right proud of the little guy, I was.  

  "(Expletive) hell!," he roared as he threw his pack onto the hotel room's bed.

  "This joint needs bulldozing! What a (expletive) cesspool! We go through three months of scrounging up every cent that we can to get here and those buggers what to get it off us in the first five minutes that we're here."

  "Ahh! You'd probably do the same if you were in their situation mate!," I told him.

  "It's early days yet. We'll probably end up loving the place. It's certainly got character."

  "Pig's arse!," he retorted.

  "D'y'see the size of that dead rat in the street outside? Christ! That thing had a politician's head on it mate."

I couldn't argue with that. It had indeed been a huge rat.

  After we'd settled into our respective rooms, we checked out the street scene from the hotel's balcony. We were about three floors up. The joint was really over budget for us but we figured that seeing as it was our first night there that we'd treat ourselves. The place had an overpowering aura of mass density. There were people everywhere and it was quite entertaining watching them go about their business. We thought that we saw someone drop dead, but they'd just tripped over something. After a while we realised that we were dying of thirst. We had set up our water containers in our rooms and dropped purifying tablets into them. They needed 24 hours to work though so we had no alternative but to seek out something to drink at ground level. Whilst discussing things on the balcony, we had evolved a plan of gently palming off the hawkers without answering them. The Jesus palm we called it. Considering that we were supposed to be on a spiritual pilgrimage, we had decided to try this before our irritability with them got us into a conflict situation. To our complete astonishment, it worked. We kept our heads down, did not make eye contact and gently brushed towards them with an open palm. It was just a polite way of saying piss off and they seemed to understand that. In that way we sensed immediately that there was something different about the Indian psyche. Gentleness seemed at least initially to be a sign for them to halt whereas a western hawker would have most likely perceived it as weakness and steamed ahead. I had no illusions to the fact that it would not have worked during one of their religious riots though.

  Downstairs, around the corner, we located the New York Snacks and Milk Bar, at least that's what the sign said. It looked like something from out of our 1950's and seemed to be using technology from that era. They had an old open topped, cool drink cabinet in which bottles of stuff were floating in a watery ice mix. Normally, we wouldn't have gone near such gaseous crap, having altered our diets considerably since embarking on the spiritual path. Shorty grabbed what looked like cola and I reached in and grabbed one as well. It was only later that we learnt that the Indians had kept out coke for years because that company would not provide them with the formula to their very popular beverage. The native cool drink industry which sprang up apparently killed some people until they perfected the art. We paid our rupees for the blackish goo that we had chosen and opened the bottles on the side of the ice box, where was located an old fashioned bottle opener. Nostalgia flooded our senses, like water running back up the tap that is memory. Then we stood back, clunked our bottles together and welcomed each other to India. I reckon that we got about three big mouthfuls each down our respective throats before geyser like, our stomachs projected it straight back up. Shorty sprayed me and I sprayed him and we looked at each other in sheer, total disbelief. My first impression was that they had boiled up some of the dead and strained their juices into a bottle. Even that does not do justice to whatever it was that attacked our taste buds. It tasted like what I assume an old, melted car tyre would. 

  "(Expletive) hell!," roared Shorty at the boy who had sold us the poison.

  "What in the (expletive) hell is that (expletive) shit?"

  "You don't like sir?," the lad answered, with a beaming smile. His accent was very Indian and his smile was innocence personified.

  "Like it! What is it? Embalming fluid mixed with African menstrual juice, or something,?" Shorty bellowed.

  "Sir?," went the lad, not understanding what had been said to him.

After some debate, we decided to make another selection. We knew that it would be risky but we only had two choices. Try something else or dehydrate to death. As if demonstrating to us that in a duality you cannot have one without the other, we pulled out some yellowish coloured bottles containing a mango type brew. These were absolutely delicious and like true westerners, we pigged out. We downed two each and took another two each back to our rooms. This involved a ten minute business conversation with the cool drink lad who was extremely concerned with the fate of his bottles. After assuring him that we would return the empties the next day and then handing over considerably more rupees as our deposit on that promise, he acceded. We left with our treasures and returned to our respective hotel rooms intent on doing some meditation. As far as we were concerned, the kid that pushed both poison and sheer deliciousness could have easily morphed himself into the head of a multinational company. He had the smile, he had the guile and he definitely had a deadly sophisticated sales technique. He knew that we were from the land of milk and honey and that we worth a fleece or two.

  Some hours later, around 7pm, we returned to the street to seek out something to eat. We were staying on the edge of the bay, not far from some arch that they'd built to supposedly celebrate some English king's visit back in the 1900's. The place was a hive of people and there were a couple of ferry type boats tied up at the wharf. They were decorated with coloured lights and music was blaring from them. It sounded like the Indian version of western rock'n'roll. We watched as obviously wealthy young Indians climbed aboard the boats to do a bit of partying. Every one of them had a tight pair of blue jeans on and a few of the girl's and their figures just about stopped us dead. However, we told ourselves that we were over the sex thing now because as our guru had advised us, sex is an acquired habit and one eventually realises that to get to the Real, one must go beyond all of the addictions of the bodily senses. So, we reinforced to each other with a huge sigh and limp groins that every woman is the Supreme Reality in disguise and moved on. What else could we do? We knew that we were ugly men and even though we were aware that we too were the Supreme Reality, on vacation, no one else did. As far as the populace in this place was concerned, we were just dollars on legs. Skin bags with wallets attached to them. In that way, it was just like home.

  Then we saw them. Rats! Big, big rats! Everywhere. Dirty great big stinking mongrel rats! Inbetween people's feet, scurrying here and there, like they owned the joint. Nibbling on what crumbs they could find and then backing their bums into their holes when human feet got to close to them. They weren't chasing the dogs and cats because we couldn't see any dogs and cats. We presumed wrongly, that the humans had eaten them long ago. They weren't nipping the babies in their cradles either, though we had very strong suspicions that that went on. With so many rats and so many fornicating people around, it seemed obvious. The masses seemed oblivious to the rodents and treated them as though they were pigeons or seagulls or something. Society's pets. Shorty just about shit himself. He hated rats and I told him in no uncertain terms to put away his likes and dislikes of all forms, names and shapes, or else he wouldn't get to the Real. Not in this life anyway. To calm him down, I stopped next to a chai seller who was carting around the biggest silver teapot that I had ever seen. I bought my mate a glass of the brown brew and had one myself. We stood there sipping contentedly away in that huge sea of humans and rodents. The old chai really hit the spot. Caffeine or no caffeine, we practically gulped it down.

  "R r r rats!," mumbled Shorty periodically.

  "(Expletive) rats!"

The lad's hands were shaking so I bought him another glass. The chai had an unusual though delightful taste. When I questioned the vendor about it he told me with a huge, satisfied smile that he had laced the brew with exactly the right amount of ginger. Just enough to give it a tang and to not make it too acrid. I complimented him on his technique and if a couple of rats hadn't come so close to us, we probably would have gone a third glass. The glasses were quite small. Shorty wanted to split though and I couldn't hold him back. I was pretty keen to get out of there myself before a rat attack brought us down. Neither of us fancied having KILLED BY LOW DOWN, DIRTY RATS on our tombstones, though many under the Earth these days could have that as a final statement about their lives.

  We headed back towards the shopping district of the area that we were in. To our relief, the rat population seemed to decrease the further inland that we went. The beggars though increased in direct proportion to the decrease in rats. There were many women holding babies and they were continually pointing to their mouths, implying please feed us. At one point we were negotiating a multitude of people on a street pavement. On our left were ritzy type shops. On our right an endless procession of street vendors selling everything that can possibly be imagined from tables and booths. I wasn't watching the ground because it was a real ordeal negotiating the thousands of people coming towards us. Suddenly I felt my left foot make contact with something and when I looked down I realised that I had kicked this fellow fair up the arse. He was on his belly dragging himself along whilst tapping his begging tin full of rupees forever forward. A snail would have left him for dead, we soon did. His legs were like burnt matchsticks and they were twisted up grotesquely behind his back. He had the appearance of a small, petrified tree branch and to this day I have never seen a skinnier human being. My thighs were bigger than his torso. I apologised profusely to him but he seemed to take no notice, he just kept inching along. I don't know where he was going to run the risk of being booted around by humanity so much. Probably to his next begging patch. For that I couldn't blame him because by the size of the pile of notes that were protruding from his tin, he was certainly the richest poor person in the street.

  We finally found an eating house that looked to be within our range and went inside. The heavy scent of incense that was in the air followed us in. The joint had many westerners in it and Shorty stopped at a table to question a couple of long hairs who looked like they'd seen better days. We figured later that maybe they'd been into the brown sugar. It sure looked like it.

  "What's the go mate?," he asked one of them.

The chap looked up from whatever it was that he was happily devouring and sized us up.

  "Thali!," he croaked, just after swallowing a mouthful.

  "Can't go past a thali!," his mate followed up.

  "Wash it down with a lassie," he advised.

  "Then follow that with a coffee. The coffee's shit but you won't get any better around here."

  "Right!," Shorty said. "Cheers mate. Thali, lassie, coffee, I got it. Haw! Lassie ay? That's not dog's piss, is it? They're not milking 'em out the back and then carving them up, are they?"

  "Nahhh! It's good shit! It's yoghurt crap. You'll like it."

We sat down and within a minute there was a lad next to us ready to take our order.

  "Thali! Lassie! Coffee!," fired off the Shorty, as if he'd been in town a month and knew exactly what it was that he was talking about.

  "Same," I told the barefooted, smiling waiter.

He came back within two minutes with two round silver trays. There was a huge pile of rice in the middle of each one. Shoved into the rice were what looked like huge, stiff, thin pancakes. They were a foot long and done up like fat rockets with the opened up, fat end nearest the ceiling. Several small silver bowls ringed the rice. These contained curries and other stuff. We dug in and by the time that we'd eaten half of the rice, we were done. Like a lot of Indian food, it was absolutely delicious. We knocked back the lassies, the yoghurt drinks and they complimented the meal perfectly. A coffee and a fag followed. As spiritual as Shorty and I thought that we were becoming, we were still struggling with the fags. The rest of the shit we had discarded like so many old socks. The booze, the drugs, the tv, the newspapers, the fast food, any interest that we had in politics or so called authorities and most of the other wanking had gone long ago. The fags though were hanging around like leeches in our mouths.

  For the next few days, we lived on thalis. We had them for lunch and tea. We toyed with the idea of going somewhere else to get out of the godforsaken metropolis that we had landed in, however, we didn't. We stayed put and began to notice things about the area that we were in. We noticed how the Indians looked after each other. At the end of the night, this was particularly evident. The street vendors with the food carts fed the blind, poor or dying. The shop owners made no fuss when 50,000 people used the footpath outside their premises as a bed. How could they? Even the deformed dude that I had booted up the rear had a lad to carry him off at the end of a hard night's begging. Sitting in a place that we had discovered that had a juke box that played western music, we discussed what it was that we were seeing. To us, here was a country that possessed atomic weapons yet had neither the beds nor toilets to satisfy the needs of millions upon millions of its people. Here was a country that had the richest spiritual heritage on Earth. They had wisdom and self knowledge of life which absolutely left western religions for dead. The west was 1000's of years behind them playing with purple robes, one book and institutional hierarchies, yet the Indians were living like dogs. Or millions upon millions of them were. Once again it was brought home to my mate and I that in a dualistic set up, you can't have one without the other. Side by side with their spiritual heritage was a gang culture which ran, literally everything. The beggar payed the gang for his spot on the street and the gang took care of him or her at the end of the night. They also ensured that no one else muscled or staggered in and dropped dead in that particular piece of  begging territory. A dead body clogs up space equally as much as a live one. It also stinks more if it hangs around long enough.

The more that we found out, the more crazy it became. The women with the babies who begged were apparently holding children who had been stolen from unfortunate parents somewhere in the rest of the country. They worked for the gangs as well. Everybody worked for the cut or commission that would keep them alive, that would put enough food in their belly to keep them going for one more day. The whole country was kept alive by corruption from the highest level to the lowest. From here we assessed that they were no different to any other country on Earth, for in these accelerated, profit motivated times, corruption is the status quo. Life feeds on life, even before it has left the belly of the mother. With a shake of our heads one night, Shorty and I told each other that the selfish, I am the body mind idea which humans cart around like a bag full of shit was the culprit and initial cause of all the ills and sufferings of the species. Like a couple of visiting ETs, having now had rudimentary experiences from our meditations and guru absorbed insights, we knew full well that we were not body minds. We also knew that the I am the body mind idea that so many humans carted around like a bag full of shit led straight to the deadliest evil in the universe. That is, the I, me, mine of the ego. The inability to act unless there is personal profit. The refusal to share. The origins of sorrow, pain and hell for if it takes forever, the spirit will destroy these false assumptions and ways of acting. No matter how many lives have to be played out in imaginary holograms to do it, the spirit will do it. It will destroy all egos because greed is spiritual sickness and totally alien to spirit's cosmic nature and the true essence of the soul. Spirit is a sport and it loves to overcome hurdles. That is a fact.

 

  We were walking down the street one fine, blue skied day, not far from where we usually ate. The street was long and the crush of India's awesome civilization was pulsating up and down it. There were black and yellow taxis everywhere that looked like 1960's western, motor cars. There were green, double decker buses that looked like the English would have gladly paid someone to take them off their island. One or two of them had the front hood, or what was left of it, flapping up and down. There were as many beings crammed into and hanging off the buses as there were navigating the over populated street. All in all, it looked like hell had erupted. Shorty and I though were digging it. We had become used to this environment and there was something about the place that was starting to get to us. There was something in the air, besides cowshit and incense. Some vibe that was titillating our spirits. Whether it was the fact that anybody could survive in such a dump or whether it was the hidden spiritual heritage that was behind and beyond the scene, we didn't yet know. What was fascinating though was that we were exploring again. This looking around at a different outer was fiddling around with our old inners. Along with the meditation and the insight that what we were seeing was our own attached mind's, generated pictures, the gap between the two was narrowing. This is what the Masters have always said. That when you make the inner the outer, then you shall know the Real, the kingdom of heaven. You shall know it, by being it. By being it, knowing it will dissolve.

  Coming across a large crowd at a pull off area, we mingled to get a view of what the commotion was. The attraction was snakes and for about 15 minutes we watched as a mongoose and a king cobra war danced with each other. The cobra was in its basket and was hissing away like a maniac as the mongoose on a long rope ringed it and taunted it. When this ended, the lads controlling the show brought out a few other snakes that could have been considered to have been of a normal size. Then they made a big, big mistake. One I think that they probably never made again. Discussing it later on, we figured that they may have been new to town and that it was the first time that they'd run their show on a crowded Bombay street. I mean, the onlookers enjoying the freebee were twenty odd deep when one of the boys started to approach the inner circle with the donations bowl. At the same time though one of the other lads dragged this huge python from out of a massive basket that everyone had been pondering the contents of. He wrapped the monster around himself, stuck his hand under its jutted out head and also headed for the inner circle. The serpent must have been about 12 foot long. I can honestly say that I have never seen a twenty deep crowd disperse so quickly. No one wanted to know about that snake, for two reasons. Firstly, it's frightening appearance and secondly, because it gave them the perfect excuse to hightail it without making a donation. People ran in all directions and Shorty and I ran with them. We laughed as we ran because it was all so unreal. We ran past the barber's shop and we ran past the food carts and the one legged guy who stood on the corner from 10 in the morning until 10 at night. What his game was we never discovered, for he never said a word to us, although we passed him many times. He was about the only Indian in the whole of Bombay who didn't try something on with us. He wasn't begging, he wasn't selling. To this day, I have no idea what he survived on. Even when we moved to the Red Shield, Salvation Army hostel across the road from him, we rarely saw him speak to anyone. He just stood there from 10 till 10, crutches underneath his arms. Perhaps he was an ET come down to observe humans, perhaps he was a guru doing the same, I don't know.

  We kept going all of the way down to the waterfront and then we turned right and kept going. We hadn't been this far before. The road ran adjacent to the beach or the bay that no one could swim in because it was full of shit. Literally too. The water was full of human poo because that's where it all got pumped. We didn't care though. The old world human system was dying, the planet was dying but we were fully aware that the inner technologies associated with cosmic consciousness could sort the joint out overnight. Because those with cc have the power to instantaneously manifest whatever they proclaim as reality. Unlike self conscious mortals who see reality as being outside their bodies and alien to them, those with cc just say to their spirits, I'll have this and there it is. If they want to bring back the dead, they do it. If they want to re-manifest what has been destroyed on a holographic world, they do it. They do it because they are aware that it's all energy. It's their energy and they can do what they like with it.

A little further up Shorty and I came across one of the most appalling, heart rendering scenes that we saw in the whole time that we there. There was another crowd. From the back of it we could see these two cowering figures sitting on a rug on the pavement. They looked as though someone had sledge hammered their heads down their throats. It appeared as though only the very tops of their roundish, deformed heads were visible. We could just make out a couple of sets of beady, very frightened eyes. There was a notice explaining that they were brothers from the country somewhere and that their parents had died. They were now being looked after by an uncle who had left them there to try and raise some cash to pay for their costs. In front of them was the traditional begging bowl. They were obviously intellectually disabled as well as being physically deformed. Every now and again their hands came up to their faces as if they were trying to hide. They kept turning their heads around and inching backwards. I don't think that they could walk. Some in the crowd were gawking at them, others were discussing them. They were a right freak show, there was no doubt about that. When the people in front of us moved away and they got a clear view of Shorty and I, they freaked. Obviously, they hadn't seen white skin before. We must have looked like a couple of ghosts to them. Their movements became more agitated and they started emitting distressed, shrill type noises. Recognising how we were effecting them, we took off. We got into a very animated debate. First we wanted to kill the swine of an uncle who had left those two poor guys there to suffer the ignominy and fear of having all of those people staring at them. They were clearly frightened out of what wits they had and had probably, up until now led secluded lives inside or near their parent's country humpy. Then we thought that perhaps the guy had little money, had to work and had no choice but to leave them there. I hope so for his sake because the karma for such an act otherwise would probably be that he'd have to come back to Earth as a wart, or a rat. It was one of the cruellest things that I have ever seen. Shorty and I both wished that we'd had cc so we could have given them normal appearance and the intelligence to fight back and tell those gawking fuckers where to go. It made me feel sick for hours that did. Shorty too. We moped back to the dive where we were hanging out to cool off. We had to get off the street because it was a nightmare out there. It was an imaginary dream that had aspects of hell floating around in it. If our minds were generating those pictures, then there was something up with our minds, that was for sure. We had freaked ourself out just when everything was flowing along quite beautifully. It was a mystery of almost unfathomable proportions. Our guru had told us that the Earth is a child of love. That afternoon we doubted him and we hadn't done that since we'd first discovered his words. It was a testing time for us until we looked at it from a soul angle. We viewed it with dispassionate detachment, yet maintained our sympathy and interest. Then we did some meditation to calm ourselves down before our nightly thali. We never made it to our usual eating joint though. A character by the name of Shyam got hold of us and he was entertainment plus.

  He was the Bombay mouth who accosted us on the street en route to our thali house. He had a distinguished moustache and like most Indians he was thinly built. He was into his 50's. A lawyer by trade, he was also a university lecturer. His wage though was only 50 odd US dollars a week. So he had developed the habit of conning up westerners to shout him a free meal, at his favourite joint. I'm not sure what he said to us to get us into this joint, but we couldn't resist him. His mouth was flapping and we just experienced this uncontrollable urge to follow it inside the gold, chromed door which he pushed open. We had seen the inconspicuous, fancy door many times though we had taken no notice of it. It seemed unrelated to the rest of the building that it was connected to and there were no windows anywhere which betrayed what was inside. What was inside was a lavish decor which at first set us back on our haunches. Shyam though assured us that it was not expensive and it turned out that he was right. When we got the bill later on, we paid it without any qualms. The food was mind blowing and Shyam was a fascinating character. It was worth a fiver each on our parts just to sit and listen to the lad.

  He was an experienced, sophisticated conversationalist who had developed the knack of drawing the listener or listeners into the dialogue. One didn't feel left out as he would talk rapidly for a while and then he would ask questions. Questions about where you came from, where you were going, what you were doing and what you felt about this or that. It made us feel important to relate to him because he listened with such a sincere interest to whatever we were saying. His eyes sparkled with life no matter whether he was talking or listening. About his local environment, he knew everything. He knew India's corruption from the top to the bottom. The day before we met him Shorty had trod on a nail that pierced his thongs. He was contemplating going to a doctor to get a tetanus shot. Shyam told him not to bother because they'd probably only shoot him up with water anyway. That same day we had met a fat Indian that layed this spiel on us about helping his family to get foreign currency out of the country. They had carpet shops in Switzerland and other places and Ravi Shankar had been around for tea the other night, he had claimed. The deal was that he would give us a big roll of US dollars to convert into traveller's cheques, because they would only give him rupees for them, supposedly. For our services, we would get 20% of whatever we cashed. The catch was that he would have to show his uncle our traveller's cheques because some Frog had recently ripped them off. Supposedly he'd gone into a bank and out of a back door and done a runner with their dosh. The fat Indian had signalled a taxi which took us to a coffee shop where he introduced us to some big Canadian guy who seemed to be sick. He was sweating profusely and was as white as a sheet. He kept raving though that he'd done the deal with fat boy the day before and pocketed 400 US bucks for his trouble. Easy money, he reckoned.

  Well Shorty had told the overweight Indian that he would physically show our cheques to his uncle. No way though was he going to sit in some stinking hot taxi whilst fat boy went inside the important looking government buildings with our loot. We had gone back to the Red Shield Salvation Army hostel where we were staying and got our cheque books from our lockers. They never showed up at the meeting spot though. Shyam told us straight out that the fat boy, the Canadian and the taxi driver were all part of a gang. It was the 20% which sucked the suckers in, he related. Only a week or so previously he told, the gang had fleeced a recently arrived English businessman of 4,000 pounds. Fat boy had gone into the important looking government building with the guy's cheques and straight out of a back door. The Canadian was in the taxi too, mouthing off that he didn't know what was going on. It was all fine yesterday, was his line. The taxi driver just shrugs his shoulders and claims that he knows nothing about nothing. The victim waits until they realise that they've been done. If they go to the police they're in trouble for willingly participating in black market activity. The police will only say anyway that they got what they deserved because they were greedy.

  Shorty and I were fascinated with Shyam's explanation and we were as glad as hell that those gang boys hadn't showed up to meet us. The way that fat boy signalled initially for the black and yellow taxi, I have to admit, was clever. No doubt, the bastard had probably been circling the block waiting for the call. There's no way in hell though that we would have known that. The street was about a mile wide and there were thousands of black and yellow taxis going in all directions. Strangely enough though, the next day after telling Shyam about the fat Indian and the ghost white Canadian, Shorty and I managed to get ourselves ripped off. It was only for a paltry 200 rupees though. The dude who did us was a master con artist. He wasn't even Indian either, he was Chinese. As good as he was though at fleecing gullible westerners, he had no sense of evading the scene of his crime. We saw him about the area 3 or 4 times after he'd conned us. His reaction to our forms more than paid us back for the rupees that he'd conned out of us. In fact, we reckoned that it was priceless. Apart from when we met the Bombay guru, he was by far the best entertainment that we came across. It happened like this.

  We were walking down by the beach out the front of a lavish hotel when we first met him. This particular hotel is an upmarket joint where rich types stay when they're visiting that part of the world. We used to have to walk in the street behind it to get to the Red Shield Salvation Army hostel where we stayed some. I'm pretty sure that if the rich and famous saw the size of the rats who nightly used the rear despatch door to go in and out of this place that they might have changed hotels. Shyam actually told us a good yarn about a Yank who paid 1,000's of greenbacks for the joint's classiest suite. He related how the Yank's missus had got up to have a wee in the early hours of the morning and encountered a fully grown, Bombay rat. Staring at her from the back corner of the loo. Apparently she jumped up on a table and started screaming her head off. Then the old boy woke up and bawled out everybody that he could because he'd paid top dollar for a suite with a resident rat. He went on for ages Shyam reckoned and the boys even had to wake the manager up. Whom the Yank then proceeded to bawl out. Yanks ay? They love to kick arse, don't they? I bet that old boy really loved that rat because it gave him the excuse to kick arse. Shorty and I laughed heartily at the story, though not as much as when we got our karma back on the Chinese lad who'd conned us out of our hard earned 200 rupees.

  Like many Indians, he was mighty thin. Tallish, but a flyweight. A clever mouth piece, not a fighter. A smooth talking con man, not a gun toting bank robber. A strong sea breeze would have blown him back around the corner. Shorty and I were by no means heavyweights, though our beards did give us a touch of a toughish appearance. He just came up to us, like they all do over there and started moving his lips. He had a very gentle voice. His English was perfect and he was extremely eloquent. He was well groomed and presented well in his disguise of a human being. He had also, no doubt from much practice, perfected his ruse. Despite that we were on our guards after encountering the fat man's gang, within five minutes of meeting him we were convinced that he was whom he said he was. A bit like everyone does with their little self when they jump into the Earth hologram. Anyway, we sat on the knee high wall that runs adjacent to the road by the beach and chatted with him for about an hour. Just down from a bunch of coy boy, de nutted, effeminate, colourfully dressed male prostitutes we were. They giggled at us some and gave us the come ons like they did everytime that we went by them. The word we'd heard was that they were the poor man's rut, but they didn't interest us. We knew that sex was an acquired habit and that we had to go beyond the sense stuff. It was a bit of a stiff trip doing it, but we were doing it. Food, fame and fortune we knew were petty things to the spirit. Mere trifles to souls who really live on the natural prana or energy that fills the universes from within and without. How can you really be rich and famous in an unreal to the core, mind dream? That is the question.

The Chinese boy claimed to be from Malaysia. He told that he worked at the Hyatt hotel in K L. He described what he did there in intimate detail. He was friendly and likeable and pretty soon Shorty and I were treating him as a long, lost cousin. He was so convincing with his down to Earth approach and his descriptions of his Malaysian life that it was a delight for us to let our guards down. He spoke as an equal to us. A fellow traveller who'd come to Bombay for a bit of a holiday. Pretty soon we were sauntering off to have a coffee in the restaurant next door to the New York Snacks and Milk Bar. We felt like we'd discovered an intelligent mate with whom we could share some sophisticated traveller's conversation. Over coffee, he asked us about our lives and we told that we were spiritual seekers and that our guru had instructed us to come to Bombay for some divine education. When he asked who was our guru and we informed him that our guru was dead, he didn't bat an eyelid. He just kept up with his methodical, soothing dialogue. We were super impressed. When he finally, after two hours of buttering us up, got around to his urgent need for 200 rupees, we couldn't get to our wallets fast enough. He had some problem with his ticket out he said and needed to ring his girlfriend in K L so that she could forward him some more dough. There had, he explained, been some delay in his flight home and he was running low on finances. We forked over a couple of notes with smiles on our faces, glad that we could help out a fellow soul. Never mind the thousands of bodies outside who were practically dying in the streets. He left soon after and when we emerged from the coffee house we spotted Mukhtar, whom we knew from the New York Snacks and Milk Bar. He was an intelligent Muslim lad and we noticed that he was looking intensely at the rapidly disappearing back of our Malaysian friend. From the expression on Mukhtar's face we developed queasy feelings which were consolidated when Shorty asked him how long the Chinese boy had been in the area. Mukhtar, like Shyam, knew everything about the neighbourhood.

  "About 2 years," he said.

  On the way back to our hotel we didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Naturally, we were pissed off because we'd just lost 10 Aussie bucks to a Chinese (expletive). However, we had to consider that we'd been done like a dog's dinner and that the lad who had done us was a consummate professional. The fact that he'd taken 2 hours to do us and that he'd even given us an address for the Hyatt hotel in K L, weighed heavily on our attached minds. By the time that we reached our pad we were laughing with the notion that he had earned his rupees. We had to admit that we had enjoyed being ripped off because he had such an indomitable perseverance and he was devilishly entertaining. We went and did some meditation and that night we told Shyam all about our run in with the Chinese boy. Shyam called us stupid bastards and laughed and laughed and laughed. His moustache twitched this way and that as he took the piss out us. Inbetween laughing at us he ordered some of the best and priciest dishes in the house. We didn't give a shit. The prices were still chickenfeed in Aussie dollars and the food tasted like it had been made in heaven. We laughed our guts out too because laughter is rocket fuel to entrapped human souls. We honestly felt no animosity towards the Chinese boy and it never entered our attached minds that we would ever see him again. There we were wrong.

  Two nights later, we spotted him in the middle of rat territory down by the wharf. It was early evening and there were people and rats everywhere, as usual. Shorty saw him first. He was walking alongside a long haired westerner and when he saw us he took evasive action. He backed off into the crowd and tried to hide himself. We could see his beady, anxiety laden eyes peeking over the tops of people's shoulders. The anxiety in them was clearly evident. This thrilled me and Shorty. I can honestly say that it was about the first time in our entire lives that we ever felt like dangerous men. It gave us an understanding of power, to think that someone was actually scared of us. We stiffened and walked on like a couple of tough gangsters. We had absolutely no desire to go near him. It was enough to us just to pretend that we were a threat to anyone.

The next night we saw him in our old thali joint. We were half way through our meals when Shorty pointed him out. He was sitting with his back to us chatting up another long haired westerner. It occurred to us to inform the westerner who he was dealing with, but we didn't get the chance. The Chinese boy noticed us whilst he was looking around. We could clearly tell from his body language that he was trying to sus out if we'd seen him. Within minutes his anxiety got the better of him and he shot off out the door. We laughed and started to feel like gangsters again. Then we spent the next 10 minutes discussing what was going on in that lad's attached mind. We would probably have just shaken his hand and told him that he was pretty good at his trade. That is, if we'd been able to get close enough to him. It was clear though that he was concerned that we would beat the shit out of him, or perhaps do him in. Silly Chinese boy. He had no idea that we were peaceful, spirit loving Australians. Like most of our fellow country women and men are. Coming from the land of milk and honey, how could we be anything else?

  Then, two days later, around 4 in the afternoon, we saw him again. We were walking along the beachfront opposite the hotel for the rich when Shorty spotted him walking briskly on the opposite side of the street. At the same time he caught sight of us and took evasive action. He ducked behind one of the wide, round column supports out the front of the hotel. Shorty nudged me in the side and signalled that we should put our asses on the little wall that ran alongside the footpath. This we did. We were pretty well in exactly the same spot where we'd first met him. Cut a 45 degree angle across the road and he was about 25 metres away from our hairy bodies. The effeminate bunch of poor man's whores were once again just up the track or from us. Sitting on the wall, as usual, they were. They made a few girlish noises at us and for a moment I think that they thought that they might be in for some business. Then they noticed the direction in which we were staring. Like us, they saw the hiding Chinese boy's beady eyes peering around the side of the column. Like us, they saw his head vanish and then reappear again. Huge, wonderful smiles broke out on their faces as they realised that some sort of game was going on between Shorty and I and the Chinese boy. They giggled and cackled and carried on a bit, like they usually did. All in all, I estimate that by the sheer force of our personalities, the mighty Shorty and I kept that lad pinned to the back of that column that was out the front of the Taj Mahal hotel for about an hour. All in all, I reckon that his head must have come out and vanished about 40 plus times. Every time that we saw him peeping around the corner though, he had the same beady little twinkle of rampant anxiety in his eyes. Then, my mate decided to accelerate the game. We had both had enough of the slowish speed. It was beginning to bore us.

  "The next time that he peeps, stand up ultra fast and walk flat out straight at him!," Shorty ordered.

This we did.

I estimate that we got almost half way across the narrow road and then we couldn't go any further. Not until we'd stopped laughing some. Even then, by the time that we did make the other side, we were still doubled over and hysterical. Everyone knows how fast Cathy Freeman can run. That Chinese boy though took off literally like a bullet out of a gun. He would have beaten any athlete over any distance this day. He would have left Superman for dead. He was a regular road runner without the beep beep and the fire coming out of his arse. The split second that we moved he took off like a rocket and ran like (expletive) hell up the street. He ran like he was imagining that we were holding onto expensive machine guns. He threw a rightie around the next corner street and was sideways airborne when he did so. Even though he was in mid air, his legs and arms were still doing 90 miles per hour. At the same time as we exploded with laughter, the poor boy's whores also erupted. They had also tremendously enjoyed the show and the humour of it had obviously delighted them. They were all tickled pink, which wasn't unusual because to us they seemed to be permanently in that state. That Chinese boy was entertainment plus. He was priceless. We never saw him again. I've a sneaking suspicion that he finally decided that Bombay was too hot a town for him. Karma is sometimes the most fascinating stuff. When you're not on the negative receiving end of it, that is. That Chinese boy, he taught us more about life than all of the years of schooling that we'd had to endure as kids. He was a master teacher and by Christ, he could run.

  That night, and it was a steamy one, we came face to face with some of our own karma. It was totally unexpected, it was raw and it was overwhelmingly powerful. To say that it blew our minds would be to massively understate the enormity of the impact that it had on us. It came to us via a dream or nightmare which we shared. This had never happened to us before and we could do nothing but take our joint nightmare as a sign from the Goddesses and Gods of the multiverses that we were two boys from down under who were running out of time. In order to explain what our unconscious selves portrayed to us it is necessary to indulge in a bit of religious philosophy. That is that for the last 2000 years the good book of the Christians has maintained that Adam, the first bloke, was made out of clay. He was a mud person. Without going into where Eve supposedly came from, the good books of the Indians which pre date the Bible by thousands of years, maintain that every human soul begins as gas. Once the soul has done its thing as gas, it then tries out mineral forms, plant forms, insect forms, reptile ones and then moves into animal ones from where it graduates into a human body. Being in a human body, the soul then has the chance to evolve through the subtle and mental bodies of the spirit until it reunites with the Supreme Soul, where it initially began. Considering that planets begin as molten rock and perhaps before that gas, the differences in these two religions as regards the origins of the human may not be that great. What was of great interest to my partner and I though was the different levels in the subtle realm. For there a soul, gripped by ego mania, can do a snakes and ladders journey right back to the gas state. To be so high and slide back to such a low state literally petrified us. Especially considering the 100s of thousands or perhaps millions of reincarnations that were necessary to evolve into the form of a moderately peaceful human. If we had known that the nightmare presented to us was nothing more than the activities of our insight team trying to hurry Epsilon along, we would not have worried at all. We did not know this though and for many moons after our deaths the characters who created this dream for us would not let us forget it. They generated much mirth between themselves whenever it was brought up. I still say though that it was a horrible thing to do to a couple of kind hearted souls. Earth however is a bit like that, as everyone knows. It's just not fair even though you get what your soul wants. Such is the nature of holograms where the pre birth memories are wiped out.

  In the presented dream, Shorty and I were portrayed as dark lords and we had been caught, finally. Dark lords are the bad guys of the astral worlds. They are, as previously mentioned, souls who have advanced themselves considerably and who have then gone off the rails on mad ego trips. Through treachery and trickery they rip off energy from whomever they can. They are the bosses of the sky multinationals. The Hitler’s and Stalin’s that are in the astral air. The thing that was so poignant about the dream though was that Shorty and I were in opposition. He had had his empire and I had had mine and we had fought like mad dogs over our astral and Earthly territories. We virtually hated each other more than the light beings who had captured us. They had bound us with strings of their strongest ethereal light and brought us before their highest council for sentencing. What that usually meant was that our souls would be unwrapped and we would have to go right back to experiencing gaseous forms. This was the usual procedure. Well, their goons dragged us before the judges as we spat, hissed and cursed at each other. I called Shorty everything under the sun and abused him relentlessly for causing our captures and he did the same to me. If they hadn't bound us we would have torn each other apart. We would have ripped each other's ethereal light forms to bits.

  "Enough! Enough!," screamed the boss judge.

The Shorty and I took no notice of the old light fart and continued to spit, hiss, rant and rave at each other. God! The language that we were using was absolutely, unbelievably filthy. Satan, who was our God and mentor, would have been tremendously proud of us. If this dream had been a 21st century film it would have grossed billions. In the first week too. The good peoples of Earth would have loved the cardinal reality of it. Our dialogue would have started off a religious cult amongst the masses that would've lasted far longer than the third Reich did.

  "Your mother sucks cocks in hell Exane!," Shorty roared at me venomously.

  "Y'father shafts priest's bums throughout eternity!," I yelled back at him.

  "Shut up or we will dispense with the formalities and take you straight to the (expletive) gas chambers!," the boss light being screamed at us.

With the realisation of what was coming, Shorty and I ceased hostilities. We looked in the direction of the judges and hissed silently at them. A bit of green astral spew flowed out of each of our gobs. Our eyes glowed red as our animosities turned towards the panel who now had power over us. It was clear that we didn't like them at all.

  "Stop it will you!," they co-telepathed to us.

  "We're prepared to make you a deal!"

The Shorty and I sideways glanced at each other. We wondered what sort of deal they had in mind. We had no doubts that it would involve being nice and doing good and so we squirmed like worms on a hook.

  "We'll forego the gas if you'll incarnate as mortals and jointly write a book that helps mortals to understand that they are destined to awaken to cosmic consciousness," the boss judge said.

  "Fuck off!," we spat at him.

The idea was absolutely repulsive to us. We had been conning mortals for centuries by reinforcing their infantile, ignorant belief systems. If they wanted to see themselves in the totally delusional and illusory limitation of identifying with being one body mind only, then that was there problem, not ours. If they wanted to view themselves as being the solid wave and not the unlimited energy ocean, then they could carry on like that until doomsday as far as we were concerned. In fact, it was exactly these false perceptions which had enabled us to rise to the heights of astral negative power. We had been feeding off their negative energies by stimulating their insatiable, judgemental dislikes for almost four centuries. It was just so easy to do because they dualised everything. We'd started wars and our puppets had headed multinational companies, governments, priesthoods and just about every other institutionalised agency known to the so called humans.  We even had them celebrating and glorifying wars which our boys had deliberately started and from which we had gorged ourselves on the deliciously produced, ample negative energies. Suffering, pain, agony and death. We loved them all so. The humans thought that they were remembering their dead on their special days. All that they were doing though was disturbing their souls with ignorance whilst feeding us a little bit more. Conning them had been a cake walk, up until now. We knew how densely asleep they were and how tremendously difficult such an assignment as proposed by the light beings would be. We had thought that the light goons were going to ask us to go and slave our guts out in an old people's home, or something. Maybe wipe a few old bums or something. We figured now though that they were trying to get us to utilise our devious insights and considerable knowledge for the benefit of the human race. Aside from the fact that we considered that their plan had absolutely no chance of success, the very idea of it was repugnantly offensive to us.

  About 2 astral metres from the gas conversion doors however, we changed our minds. The bastards had us and they knew it. They had offered us a fate worse than death and they were quite aware that no matter how much we hated it, we wouldn't be able to refuse their offer. The smug looks on the faces of those goody, two shoes light beings made us feel totally sick. As far as we were concerned, they were the rotten ones, not us. The deal though was done. We did however insist on a clause which stated that we were in no way responsible for the marketing of whatever garbage that we conjured up. We would write it but if they wanted the (expletive) humans to read it, then it was up to their Earthly representatives to make that happen. Afterwards we were to be able to continue with Earthly incarnations free of any higher demands. From where we were coming from, that was punishment enough. To have to do all of that corporeal stuff again was like being sentenced to hell anyway. Being in a body that can get sick or bleed and whose asshole needs wiping every day or so. What a drag! We consoled each other with the prospects that whilst on the Earth doing this godforsaken job that we might at least get a rut. It was a small consolation, though it was better than nothing. After all, we were two former high astral rollers. Old enemies, now allies who were headed back into the dimension of the insane, ass wipers. We had to come up with something to cheer ourselves up. We felt pretty bad about having to rejoin the lowest of the spiritually low, the gross human beings.

  "I'm really looking forward to getting a rut," the dark lord Shorty said quietly to me as those (expletive) light beings herded us towards the descension tubes.

  "Yeah! Me too comrade," I mumbled back, sounding about as convincing as he did.

  "Here we (expletive) go!, here we (expletive) go!, here we (expletive) go!," we sang as the swines forced us to go down, down, down.

 

 

 

                                                                 *

 

 

 

 

  "Lunch!," said gay Gary as he stuck his head around the side of Carol's door.

  "Want anything from the deli?"

  "Yeah!," mumbled Carol as she went for her purse.

  "Don't bother," he told her.

  "I'll buy today and you can buy on Monday."

Carol agreed and ordered a cheese and salad roll and an apple slice.

  "How's that going?," Gary asked, noticing that she had made inroads into the manuscript.

  "It's (expletive) crazy!," she told him.

Gary laughed and commented that it couldn't be any worse than the shit that he was reading. He left and Carol went again to the toilet. When Gary returned he found her in the staff room making them both a coffee. They had lunch and chatted some and then went back to work. Carol actually found herself keen to get back to the story and this surprised her. She was really beginning to wonder what sort of crap the Bombay guru was going to come out with. She considered that his appearance couldn't be too far away.

 

 

 

 

                                                                      *

 

 

 

 

  Shorty was out on the hotel's third floor balcony when I came out of my room. It was around three in the morning. The nightmare had woken me up in a cold sweat. When I saw him I knew instantly that he had experienced the same dream. He was leaning over the balcony railing with a fag dangling from the fingers of his right hand. Sweat was pouring off him and both of his hands were shaking as though he was having some sort of fit. I was in exactly the same state as I leant over the railing next to him and lit up another stick of death. Somewhere on the other side of the world, some swine that headed a multinational company made another 25 cents as I did so. The damn fag shook this way and that as I tried to get it into my gob. At the same time my partner in crime turned sideways and looked at me with a sheer expression of  divine horror plastered all over his face.

  "Dark lord dream?," he asked me nervously.

I nodded in the affirmative and he scowled viciously and atrociously. For a moment I thought that he was going to start loudly barking at me.

  "And all of this (expletive) time I thought that we were the (expletive) good guys! This is (expletive) unbelievable!," he roared instead.

  "Those (expletive) light beings! I'd like to get me hands around their (expletive) goody, two shoes throats! Why don't they come down here and write their own putrid, you're all destined for the ultimate success crap?"

I nodded my agreement once again. I felt exactly the same way. Why the (expletives) had to send us to this horrible (expletive) shithole of a planet to do their dirty work, I'll never know. They would have had far more chance of being successful than we did. At this stage I have to admit that I was day dreaming of being some floating, lightly, brightly coloured gas.

  "Well! There's only one thing for it," the Shorty remarked coldly.

  "You'll have to write this (expletive, expletive expletive) of a book!"

  "Hohh! I like that!," I exploded.

  "I have to write the (expletive) book! And what's going to be in this (expletive) book and what the (expletive) are you going to contribute to it?"

  "I'll help with the story," he said coolly.

  "What (expletive) story?," I roared.

  "What about that one you were talking about before we left home?"

  "Shorty! I was thinking of changing genres and doing a serial murder mystery. That sort of morbid shit seems to sell. My stuff doesn't. How in the hell though is that type of genre going to tell people that they are destined to inherent something as abstract and fantasy ridden as cosmic consciousness?"

  "Well! We'll think of something!," he yelled back at me.

  "We'd better!," I asserted loudly. "Or you know where we're headed."

He turned towards me again and some more cold sweat ran down his forehead.

  "I don't give a (expletive) what any (expletive) says!," the lad told me.

  "There's no (expletive) way that I'm doing the (expletive) gas again! They can all go and get (expletive)d!"

  We got no sleep for the rest of the night. In fact, we went into Shorty's room and spent hours trying to come up with some sort of storyline that suited the conditions of our Earthly parole. Nothing came though. We tried this and we tried that but we just couldn't come up with anything that would help two old dark lords get off the hook with the light beings. Not long after dawn we started to wander the streets. All day long we paced the city pavements. We even caught a few buses and sat here and there until the momentum of our anxiety drove us on. Many Indians looked at our depressed faces. I'm sure that they thought that we were victims of some bad brown sugar dope. We were dazed, phased, moody, irritable and downright displeased with our temporal existences. We couldn't even eat, we were so out of sorts. We went over the dream again in an attempt to convince ourselves that it was just a dream like any other dream. This only made us feel ten times worse because every detail of our respective dreams that we could remember was absolutely identical. On separate pieces of paper we wrote down descriptions of the boss judge of the light beings and when we compared notes they were exact. I even drew a picture of him and when Shorty saw it his face went ghost white.

  "That's the bastard!," he hollered.

  "That's the dirty rotten, son of a (expletive)!"

We were left with only one overpowering conclusion. The dream had told us the truth and we had to come up with the story of the century to get ourselves out of the deep, deep shit that we were in. If we didn't, we were gas.

  At dusk we drifted back to the area where we were staying. We went and sat in a coffee shop, restaurant that was next door to the New York Snacks and Milk Bar. Like many places in India, it opened onto the street. Outside, on the rock hard pavement, many of the city's poor were already in position to sleep the night. It was a cruel scene which we had become accustomed to and which because of our current psychic states, were ignoring. We had still not come up with one sentence for our story and we were now even more depressed. We were in fact, downright paranoid. One of the shop boys came up to serve us as we sat morosely, heads down in a faraway corner. I noticed that one of his thongs or flip flops had a broken strap and so his foot was more on the floor than it was on the thong. Shorty noticed it too and by Indian standards we knew that the guy was quite rich. At least he had a pair of thongs. The dudes at our favourite thali joint didn't.

  "Coffee!," we mumbled dejectedly to the lad.

  "Something to eat sirs?," he added.

We nodded our heads. The lad seemed confused as he took off. Westerners that didn't want to eat were obviously a worry to him. Within minutes he brought us the brown brews and we sipped from them as though we were going to get the gas at midnight. I was half way through mine when I looked up and noticed a strange looking character staring at us from the surrounding pavement. I nodded to Shorty that it looked like we were going to be bugged by yet another down and out Indian. The guy appeared as though he hadn't had a bath for the last year or so. There was something weird about him however. It took me a while to sus it out. Eventually I realised that underneath all of the dirt that he was carrying that he was white. Shorty, initially hostile to being disturbed saw it too. Our curiosity was aroused. The stranger picked up on this and entered the joint and came over to our table.

  "How do you do sirs?," he said, with an unmistakable Indian accent.

  "I am Sachin and I come from the black hole."

  "Don't we all brother! Don't we all!," Shorty retorted.

The stranger looked confused, then surprised.

  "You have recently been in Calcutta too then, have you sirs?," he asked.

  "Oh! That black hole. I thought that you meant the other one," Shorty roared.

  "Other one?," Sachin asked curiously. He seemed to ponder things a bit and then an enormous smile broke upon his face.

  "Oh sir!," he said. "You have a devious mind."

  "You don't know the half of it brother!," Shorty quipped.

  One of the boys then came over and more or less told our guest that he either had to buy something or piss off. We sorted this out by buying him a coffee for two rupees. He refused anything to eat. As our conversation proceeded with him he revealed that his parents were Portuguese and that they had been killed in an Indian bus accident when he was a babe. He had been brought up by a rural family in the south of the country after attempts to locate his parent's relatives in Portugal had proved fruitless.

  "What are you doing in India?," he asked us.

  "Seeking!," Shorty told him.

  "Seeking what?," he asked.

  "Realisation and the book of the century," I remarked.

For a moment our guest pondered this.

  "That is a strange combination," he said eventually.

  "I too am a seeker. I chase the Real even though I appear to live in the unreal. What is this book that you have spoken about sirs?"

Shorty looked at me and I looked at Shorty as we tried to decide whether it was worth revealing our dark secrets to a total stranger. After a while though we told him everything as though he was our psychiatrist. We left nothing out and we brought him right up to date with our predicament. Whilst we were telling him about our joint dream he sipped calmly from his coffee and looked inquisitively at each of us in turn. Several times he did this. When we had finished he paused as if to think carefully about what we had told him. Then he spoke.

  "You don't look like dark lords," he commented.

  "You look more like that you come from the land of milk and honey."

  "Same thing these days," quipped Shorty. "If you work for a multinational or vote for their political dogs or buy off them, then you're part of that energy."

Sachin smiled.

  "How can you believe in the reality of a dream that has happened within a dream?," he asked.

  "Don't you know that you are in a holographic, mind dreamt up matrix and that nothing really is here? Don't you know that's it's all the pure energy of consciousness which the mind converts into matter shapes? Pictures projected by the hangovers of past karmas, spawned by desire and memory, produced by imagination. If you are seeking the true reality of the Nameless One like I am, why should anything that happens in the realm of the unreal bother you?"

Shorty and I were absolutely astounded by the level of Sachin's awareness. For someone who had the appearance of a dirty bum, he related as though he was extraordinarily familiar with our beloved guru's book. Such is the nature of India that someone who looks like nothing can in fact be everything, yet be fully aware that they are in the true reality, nothing in particular. Classically was this bloke representing to us to never judge a book by its cover.

  "We've got to get this story together brother or were goners!," Shorty told him emphatically.

  "It's our (expletive) karma and we've got to pay it off! Dream or no dream, we have to do it."

  "In one (expletive) lifetime too!," I added.

  Our guest looked thoughtful again. He ran one of his hands through the dirty mop of hair that was attached to his head.

  "I am going to visit my guru tomorrow," he said.

  "Would you like to come with me and talk to the Master about your problem?"

  "What's his name?," Shorty asked.

Sachin told. My partner and I just about shit ourselves with excitement. We recognised the name and further questioning of our new friend revealed that his guru had been a disciple of our beloved, book producing, dead one. Indeed, he was his direct successor. We could hardly contain ourselves for suddenly we saw that there was light at the end of the tunnel. We invited Sachin to come and stay at our hotel but he refused. All of that night we tossed and turned in our beds. We hardly slept at all because of our excitement and because we were fearful of having more nightmares. Our arrangements with Sachin were that we were to meet him at 3pm, so shortly before 2 o'clock in the afternoon we left the hotel. We intended to walk the 4 k's or so to the spot where we were to meet up with him. After negotiating numerous streets we mysteriously came across a very dirty kitten who appeared to have a very sore paw. The poor little puss could hardly walk. Shorty was just about in tears because of the little cat's down and out state. He picked it up and began asking people if they knew where he might find its owner. It soon became evident from their answers that the little puss was an orphan and so my good mate vowed to find it a respectable carer. We had not gone much further when we came across one of my frog brothers who also had a hurt leg. The poor little chap could hardly hop and was in danger of either being trod on or squashed by the numerous forms of modern technology that were rushing by him. I had on a shirt with an upper pocket and so I picked him up and placed him in the pouch that was closest to my heart. Neither Shorty nor I had ever understood the tremendous affinity that we felt for frogs and cats. We only knew that it was our divine mission to protect and look after them whenever we could. It was thus that when we met Sachin that Shorty was nursing a little pussy in his arms and I had one of my beloved frog brothers poking his head out of my shirt's pocket. Occasionally, my little brother let out a bit of a croak as if to testify that he was quite happy with the new arrangements in his universe. Sachin looked at us curiously and another enormous smile broke upon his face when we told him that our friends were both carrying leg injuries.

  "You are saints sirs," he told us.

  "Nahhh! We're just Australians," Shorty replied.

 

 

 

                                                                     *

 

 

 

  Adam moved his behind slightly as he fiddled with his cigarette packet. He could feel some wind building up in his lower bowels and he wished to expunge it as quietly as he could. Unfortunately for him, the air came out of him too fast and bounced off the vinyl of the chair that he was sitting on. The result was the noise of an unmistakable fart which reverberated around the room. Charlie, who was engaged in a game of chess over the other side of the room, looked up with concern in Adam's direction.

  "Any GST on that one Adam?," he asked.

Adam smiled as he lit a cigarette.

  "Nahh Charlie!," he said as he flicked a dead match into a nearby ashtray.

  "That one's tax free."

  "I should (expletive) hope so!," another being exclaimed.

  "I hope that that's not a reflection on the story that you're reading Adam!," someone else said.

  "Nahh!," Adam retorted. "There's nothing wrong with this story. This is a people's story."

  "Well, what's it saying then?," asked a 19 year old who had recently been told that she had schizophrenia.

  "It's saying not to identify with the mind's this's and that's but to hold firm with the spiritual I am."

  "What?," asked an alcoholic.

  Adam sighed.

  "It's saying Jock not to identify with any other description other than I am, I know I am, I exist because I am. It's saying to get into the wordless sensation of the descriptionless I am because it's the only thing in your entire existence which never changes. It's saying that the I am is the door which leads to the serenity of the soul's true reality and home."

  "Well, I'll be fooked!," said Jock.

  "It's like that then is it laddie?"

  "It is Jock, it is. It is because if you really use your brains and investigate truly, nothing that you can perceive or conceive can be your real self. If you can perceive the endless chatter of the mind that is driving you crazy, then who you really are must be outside of the mind, beyond thought." Adam asserted. "Beyond even the I am sensation in the immutable Supreme Reality. That's your real Self!"

  "Well I'll be fooked!," said Jock once more.

  "You've been fooked for forty years Jock!," someone down the other end of the room cried out.

  "Longer than that laddie!," Jock asserted.

  "He's not fooked!," retorted Adam.

  "He's just been identifying with being fooked! He's been running on psychic imagination. That's what the book is saying. None of us are fooked. We just identify with being fooked because we don't really know who we really are. We identify with a projected little self which we mistakenly perceive to be separate and alone. That's what buggers us. We blind ourselves to the light by denying that we are all the same spiritual energy manifesting as different forms."

  "Well, if I'm not fooked, then what am I?," enquired Jock.

  "You are the Supreme Reality manifesting at a single point as that body Jock or you are the shoreless ocean manifesting as a wave. Don't identify with being the wave because that's false. It's illusion. Identify with being the shoreless ocean because that's who you really are."

An enormous smile broke upon Jock's weather beaten, wrinkled face.

  "Well, I'll be fooked!," he said to no one in particular.

  "I'm a fooking ocean!."

  "You've drunk enough piss to fill up an ocean Jock!," the bloke from the other end of the room cried out.

  "I think that you'd better stop reading that book Adam before you spontaneously combust!," Charlie asserted.

  "Ahh! Piss off the lot of yuse," snorted Adam as he flicked to the next page.

  "I'm the fooking ocean!," Jock mumbled in the background.

  "Well I'll be fooked."

 

 

 

 

                                                                     *

 

 

 

 

  We had no idea where we were or where we were going and it was a considerable effort to keep up with Sachin. For such a skinny bloke, he moved like Superman. We went up some of the narrowest streets that I've ever seen. We went down some of the narrowest streets that I've ever seen. We emerged from time to time from these crevices and crossed some of the busiest, widest streets that I've ever seen. We went up steps, down steps and around numerous corners. I was beginning to think that we were going to be forever lost in this poverty stricken, run down jungle when he stopped and said the magic words to us.

  "Well, here we are sirs!"

No matter what Shorty and I said to him we couldn't seem to stop him from calling us sirs. I guess that it was so ingrained in him that it had become a habit. He seemed to call everybody sir.

  We scrutinised the building outside of which we were standing. I can say honestly that it did not look like the sort of joint where some one who had cosmic consciousness would hang out. Had this building been in an Australian suburb, most likely it would have had a demolition order on its front door. In India though anything can happen and anything can survive and usually does. So we went inside and followed our guide up a set of wooden stairs. He turned left and proceeded to a small door which was half open. He stuck his head inside the room and spoke to someone in Marathi, the local language, or it could have been a dialect. I'm not sure. This was the first indication that Shorty and I had that perhaps the guru did not speak English. The unmistakable smell of incense wafted out of the room as our friend turned to us and indicated that we should follow him in. Both Shorty and I were extremely nervous at this point. Neither of us had ever met a real, live guru and the one that we were going to meet was a disciple of a being whose philosophy we had admired and worshipped for some time. We were therefore hoping like hell that he would be able to set us straight on this book writing, dark lord business. We were also drenched in Bombay sweat and trying our hardest to contain our injured guests who had suddenly decided to writhe around. They had obviously become bored with our company and were manifesting a strong desire to escape our clutches.

  It was thus exactly as we entered the Bombay guru's domain that Shorty's pussy cut loose and my frog brother jumped clean out of my shirt pocket and landed on the floor in the middle of what was, a tiny room. The cat, seeing the frog in front of him went up on all fours, stiff haired and let out a ferocious yeowl that considerably bellied its age. My frog brother let out a massive croak and for a moment I thought that there was going to be trouble. Then a very strange thing happened. There were four people in that tiny little room and they were all squatting in the lotus position on the floor. They were sitting on cushions. One of them was about 80 odd years old and I figured rightly that he had to be the guru. Two of the others were much younger, probably in their thirties. The other was a lad of 15 or so. They were all smiling joyously as though they'd just enjoyed some good happy weed or something. They also seemed pleased with the entertainment that we had brought along with us. The guru said something in Marathi and the other dudes and Sachin laughed their heads off. Then the cat settled right down to an amiable disposition and went over to my frog brother and sniffed him gently. The guru spoke again and the little cat trotted over to him and after a pat or two settled down comfortably on the old guy's lap. He let out a purr or two of contentment and closed his eyes. My frog brother then, without any visible signs of distress, hopped over and jumped up on one of the guru's knees. He let out a small croak and sat in such a way that one would have thought that he was on the edge of his favourite pond. Shorty and I found it all hard to believe and then we noticed this incredible aura of peace in the tiny room. The temperature seemed to be just right although there was no air conditioning or fan. Outside in the street, it was stinking hot. There were some photos on the walls and I caught sight of a few of our beloved guru and nudged Shorty. Then I looked back towards the guru. His eyes were sparkling like two sea blue jewels and he seemed somehow to be emanating this incredibly aware, alert coolness. I realised that I no longer felt the slightest nervousness and the delicious sensation ran through me that my good mate Shorty and I had found our man.

  We nodded as politely as we could to him and sat down on two cushions which the young lad gave us. We were sitting in the middle of the room facing the guru. The other guys were sitting along the wall to our left and Sachin was sitting slightly in front of us to our right. Straight away Sachin told us that the cat and my frog brother would be well looked after by the guru and his pals. This was a weight off our western minds and we relaxed some more. Our wards had escaped the curry pot and of that we were mighty glad. Job well done we told ourselves. We thanked the guru and he smiled and nodded our way. Sachin then launched into a discussion with the guru, presumably about us and our problem. A couple of times he pointed at us and once or twice the old guy did too. Then I heard Sachin mention the evil words, dark lords. Once again, he pointed at us. The ears of the guys on our left seem to stretch upwards when he said it. They were listening super intensely to what our guide was saying. Shorty and I remained Aussie calm. We hadn't come here to scare anybody, we just wanted some information. Sachin spoke some more and mentioned the evil words again. The ears on the guys to our left stretched upwards even further and looks of sheer intense curiousness wafted over their faces. In contrast, an enigmatic smile appeared on the guru. He pointed at us as his smile broadened.

  "Dark lords?," he asked Sachin.

Sachin nodded yes.

The old guy then literally exploded with laughter. He rolled to the left and he rolled to the right. The puss on his lap woke up and my frog brother croaked three times. The other guys started howling with laughter as well. So did Sachin. Shorty and I looked at each other and we really didn't know what to think. By now the guru had a hand over his belly as if it was hurting him. He was still in a state of supreme mirth. Something, some force, some energy, I don't know what, then got hold of Shorty and I. We began to laugh as well. Once we'd started, we couldn't stop. It was like the floodgates had opened and it just felt so good to take that damn, horrible seriousness that was in our lives and pulverise it with mirth. By the time that we'd all settled down, my partner and I couldn't have cared less about having to start from gas again. We would have been quite happy with such a floating nothingness.

  The guru then spoke again with Sachin. Sachin listened with intense interest and deference. Then he turned to us.

  "The Master says to tell you that by Earthly measurements of time that he is 87 years old but that he feels like a child. His stance is that it is good to be and it is good to be like the child and to have no complex, abstract language or conditioned, deluded, endlessly chattering mind positioned inbetween yourself and the Supreme. He says in Reality that he was never born nor shall he ever die. However, he wishes to express that in the last 87 years he has not heard a better (expletive) cock and bull story than yours! Most just imagine themselves to be a body and a mind but you two have gone considerably further. You have taken imagination to new heights. He says that you do not look like dark lords. He says that you look like you come from the land of milk and honey and that you took too much LSD in the seventies. He said that there are still a few entities hanging off your energy bodies that were associated with those drugs. He says not to worry though and that they will soon leave and go back to the sixth dimension where they belong," is what the Indian who had had Portuguese parents told us.

  Shorty and I looked at each other and we were absolutely astounded. We were getting information but it was not the sort of stuff that we had expected.

  "What dimension is this then Sachin?," I asked. I already knew the answer but at this stage I wanted confirmation of everything. One of the guys along the wall leaned forward.

  "You are in the third dimension sirs," he said quietly.

  "You are in third dimensional bodies on the gross plane."

I nodded my thanks to him and he smiled wonderfully back at me. An Indian smile is sometimes priceless.

  "The dream was so realistic though Sachin!," Shorty asserted.

He gesticulated with his western hands.

  "Mine was exactly the same as Exane's. We checked. How can that be?"

Sachin nodded and spoke once again with the Bombay guru. Then he turned to us again.

  "You have some very good friends in the fourth dimension," he told us.

  "They manufactured the identical dream for you for one reason only. That is that you should get along with manifesting the book. The book is important, the dream was not. They have a name for the book too. It is called, Epsilon."

  "Epsilon?," went Shorty.

  "Epsilon?," I followed up.

We looked at each other and we couldn't make head nor tails of it. How could anyone have known about the title that Shorty had originally dreamt up? It was as if we were in a Phantom comic and the Ghost Who Walks had just slugged us on our jaws. It was exceedingly difficult for us to tell who was imagining what. The guru and Sachin then conversed again. Sachin kept nodding. After a while, he faced us again.

  "The Master says that it is exactly as Shakespeare said. That the world is a stage upon which players or souls act out their lives. He says that there is no reality in it, that it is just like a picture show that you see at the movies and that most people make the calamitous error of believing it all to be real. He says that our parts in this play of consciousness are to a certain extent, written, planned and rehearsed in the fourth dimension and that you two planned to do this book to tell others about cosmic consciousness. He thinks that you are two punks from the land of milk and honey with massive ambitions. His heart is glad though that you have substantially widened your desires and that you are keenly interested in waking up from the mind evoked dream of limited matter into the spirit reality of unlimited energy."

  Shorty and I nodded. There wasn't much else that we could do. We were in a kind of shock having had it reinforced that we really were a couple of good guys from the land of milk and honey.