"Finally, I'm pretty sure you aren't dreaming. I've never heard of anyone wake up from a dream after death. If you died, I'm pretty sure you would be exactly that. Dead."
Fair enough. Stacey had decided to accept what was happening to her was real and she wasn't dreaming and so the man's response as to whether she would wake up if she died had been expected.
The man helped Stacey back up onto her feet and reached over to close her wide open mouth. She hadn't realised when her jaw had dropped open while she had been listening so intently. It was a lot of information to take in.
His thumb brushed across her chin lightly before he withdrew his hand, fingers sliding across the skin under her chin. Stacey felt her insides shiver and then go very still for a moment. What was that for? It was unlikely that touch was showing any interest in her at all. As if. They'd only just met for the first time. Unless the man was lecherous? But he didn't look like a lecher. But then, not all perverts looked like perverts. He hadn't made any other moves and her open mouth had probably made her look even uglier than her current tear smudged makeup and red, puffy eyes did. That was probably it. Stacey disregarded his touch, focussing back on the questions and information at hand.
She was on another planet in another galaxy. Well, it could be the same galaxy with a different name, but what on earth? She was on another planet! Nobody at home would ever believe her if and when she ever got home to tell the story. For now, she was going to have to absorb as much information as possible and find a way to blend into society here.
"I need to write this all down," Stacey muttered, worried she was going to forget all this important information. She looked down to try and memorise everything she had just learnt.
"Don't worry. We'll get you a private tutor so that you can get up to speed with all the other kids," the man said with a pat on the shoulder. "You said you don't know any Tadpole at all? Not the spoken or the written? You only know Common English?"
"I guess. Yes," Stacey said, still trying to process all the information.
"The sun is going to set soon," the man pressed his lips together, and looked at where the peachy sunset colours were fading into the twilight. "You're going to have to study very hard in order to catch up and be considered competition that needs to be taken seriously. As for your questions about Tadpole, Tadpole is both a part of our heritage and also a big part of our way of life. Anything formal is almost certain to be written in Tadpole. People tend to mix the two languages together and younger generations are always coming up with new slang and new ways to combine the two together although their grammar is greatly incompatible. You've probably been brought up by some isolationist cult group that has been trying to live cut off from the rest of the world, if you only know Common English. Likely one of the Beggar Chicken groups after they lost the civil war. As for you being ordinary, everyone can see that you're anything but ordinary. There is no set definition for ordinary anyway and so it doesn't really matter. Does that answer all your questions for now?"
Beggar Chicken? What kind of name was that? The Beggar Chickens fought in the civil war and lost. Why did this sound so ludicrous and nonsensical?
"I think so?" Stacey sounded as uncertain as she felt. She rubbed her sore wrist again.
"What do you think of dinner?" the man asked her, laying a hand on her shoulder. The hand seemed somewhat comforting at this moment when right now, Stacey really wanted a good long hug. So she didn't try to brush the hand away.
"Dinner… I'd like to have dinner," Stacey said cautiously, finally daring to look up into the man's face only to find it obscured by the shadows in the falling dark, despite the light from the cameraman, "but am I allowed to? Marvel didn't want me there. He was worried that I might be a spy or something."
"I'm pretty convinced after seeing how frustrated you are and hearing you talk to yourself that you're not a spy. Although talking to yourself makes you look crazy in real life, it works well for the purposes of the entertainment industry and shows a realistic and genuine side of you. I'm glad to see that your brain is intact and working. As for what your forgotten background is, I'm sure we can cross that bridge when we come to it. There are so many people supporting you now. They've already released the edited individual auditions of all the trainees on the interweb. We're all cheering you on and eager to see what you're going to do and become. See how you're going to wow us next."
"But Marvel…"
"Marvel has to do what I say," the man grinned and his teeth gleamed in the dark. "After all, I am his boss. I heard all the noise the moment I arrived and got bombarded by the majority of the staff who insist that you are worth all the trouble even if you literally walked off the street into the program. So why don't you come on back and prove to me that I've made the right call in allowing you to stay and 'eat'? Hmm? Show me you're worth all this trouble and extra money I'll be putting forward just to get you up to speed with your peers?"