Finding Utopia

Chapter 1: A Strange Encounter

It's dark and hot outside; Luz falls asleep to a weird smell, not off-putting but quite unfamiliar. She quickly dreams she travels through a tunnel, a seemingly infinite stargate; she reaches a place, unlike anything she's ever seen before.

A strange planet, with strange vivid vegetation, and huge crystal and quartz formations, in the distance; a futuristic city, the air seems clean but it's somehow harder to breathe, "Perhaps it's too humid? too hot? " She thinks to herself.

She walks down a paved road towards a city, on the way; two very beautiful people appear from thin air, they keep looking at her like she's unlike anyone they've met before. One looks at her with disgust while the other looks at her with pure fascination.

"I don't know what's up with this woman but she better not give me that attitude," she thinks to herself. Suddenly, she experiences a hypnic jerk and wakes up puzzled at what she just saw, the dream was way too realistic, and she felt everything with her senses. "Ugh, whatever, I'm too tired to think about this," she says to herself as she went under the covers and closed her eyes.

Luz is a 27-year-old brunette, black wavy hair with tanned skin, and light brown eyes; she works as a freelance video editor and leads a normal -somewhat boring- life, she, however, likes to dress in fun old 30s 40s, and 50's styles sometimes as she finds them to fit her best.

Anyways, now that we know a bit about Luz, let's move on with the obligatory introduction to the other characters, her friends.

The next day, after a long day of working, Luz joins her friends at a local pub. so she tells them about her weird dream.

Thiyya: "Sounds like you went on a psychedelic adventure my dude, was it cool?" says her best friend, female, cook, very tall, green eyes, pale skin, brown hair, looks like a model, walks like a giraffe.

Ziri: "Can you go back to sleep and get me that woman's number?" jokes her closest male friend that could easily be mistaken for a girl, with long lashes, big brown eyes, brown long hair, slender, pretends to be a playboy but is a total sweetheart.

Maya: "What if you Astro projected through a portal to another dimension or something, but like; since those people saw you, your higher-self sensed danger and sent you back and so you woke up," says her other bestie with her usual poker face, Maya is irrefutably the hottest and the smartest in the friend group, golden brown skin, big amber eyes, wears her black hair in an afro, curvy, doesn't talk much but always has something interesting or something weird and unheard of to say.

Everyone turns to Maya in pure confusion, they don't know if she's way smarter than they could comprehend or if the universe is fair and she has a weird goofy side.

Luz: "Anyways, I don't really know what to think of it, but how can it feel so real?"

Ziri: "What did you eat before you slept?"

Luz:" Does that really matter?" *sighs* " Ugh, let's just forget about this, I'm done drinking for the night, and I have some project I really need to finish, see you later guys"

Luz goes back home, she feels a presence following her, but every time she looks back or uses her phone's front camera to see what's behind her, there's absolutely no one.

She shakes her head off and hurries back home, as she opens the doors, she feels a sudden breeze entering her house before her, she freezes for a second because it's a hot summer night and there's absolutely no wind, " Ah, maybe I'm overthinking this, I need to get over myself" she says as she enters her apartment.

She goes in for a shower and has this weird feeling that someone or something is peeping at her, this eerie gut instinct doesn't leave her as she leaves the shower, "Why do I feel like this? I've never felt anything like this!" she thinks to herself. She checks her small apartment with a wooden spatula in her hand as a weapon for anything or anyone, but can't seem to find anything, She decides to turn abruptly with a swing and suddenly her chair moves and her tumbler falls from her table as if someone hit them by accident, she notices she's too far from it, it couldn't have been her own doing.

Luz is completely frozen, she tries to move but can't, time seems to stop, she's surprisingly calm, it took her a while to move "Who is this? A ghost? Is someone wearing the invisibility cloak from Harry Potter? Show yourself before me wizard" She says loudly as her voice cracks a few times because she's physically shaking.

Luz: "What's going on? "

Male voice: "Fear me not "

Luz: "Oh no, I'm hearing a voice, am I dreaming? Am I schizophrenic? Wait, did I accidentally take drugs?"

Male voice: "I am going to show myself to you but, do not be scared, we already met yesterday, remember?"

Luz: "I don't remember meeting any ghosts, sir"

Male voice: "Don't be silly, ghosts don't exist! I am what you call an extraterrestrial!"

Luz: "I've gone senile, at the young age of 27... I had so much potential...but now I'm talking to a male voice... should I start dating again?"

Male voice: "I don't see the correlation, but sure, I will date you...now, I'd like to show and introduce myself, it will make things much easier"

Luz: "No wait! I want to preserve the remains of my sanity"

Male voice: "I don't think not seeing me can help with that"

Luz: "Bruh, no need to put salt on my open wound"

Male voice: "I happen to be honest"

Luz: "Why don't I feel threatened by your presence? Why am I so calm?"

Male voice: "I mean no harm, and I am sending you calming waves, you humans can't do that yet"

Luz: "Ok, show yourself, I really need to know how far my insanity will take me"

Male voice: "Very well, here we go"