"Yes," I said, thinking it over. "And some of the students couldn't see me until I got into this physical body."
"Actually," Carol said, "only level nines and tens are always clairvoyantly aware, so it's possible for anyone in our Alpha to occasionally miss seeing an astral traveler."
"What's the advantage of traveling around in your astral body?" I asked.
"Well," Carol answered, "it's the only way you can travel to any of the non-physical dimensions. But the reason our upper levels use it so much is that it takes considerably less energy than translating the physical body from place to place. Astral travel permits instant translation to a series of places without fatigue."
"What do you mean, Carol?" I asked. "I don't remember anything 'instant' about my traveling when I first came here. In fact, when Lea and I were running to the research center I couldn't even catch up with her!"
Carol laughed. "That's because you thought you were occupying a physical body, and you were limited by your belief. You didn't think your physical body could run any faster, so it didn't. It's as simple as that."
"You mean," I asked, "that if I had realized I was using only my astral body I could have traveled faster?"
"Faster, indeed!" was her response. "Faster than the speed of light. That is, of course, if you believed it was possible. You see, the astral body has no mass, and, thus, is not limited by the speed of light. In other words, at the astral level your mind is not hampered by clumsy, dense, physical matter, so a thought manifests its consequences immediately. You just visualize it and it happens. Level tens can do the same thing with physical bodies, but it takes more thought energy."
I shook my head and, turning to Carol, exclaimed, "That's amazing! I'd really like to learn to do that."
"We'd better master telepathy first," Carol responded as she looked over to where Eli had been standing, then back at me.
I followed her glance to the spot where our Ktar had been, but he was no longer there. "Where'd he go so. fast? To another Delta?"
"You need more practice, Jon," she noted. "You missed his greeting to us as well as his statement that he was leaving us to go visit with Lea."
I felt embarrassed at missing Eli's communication to us. I had thought I was doing pretty well, but that certainly put me back in my place. "I really wanted to talk to him, too. Guess I need a lot more practice," was my painful conclusion.
Another question popped into my head. "Say, you mentioned that he was a Ktar. I was wondering, are all your leaders level tens?"
"The top ones, yes," Carol answered, "Our three Mutars, who are leaders of 100-million-member Mutons, and the thirty Ktars, who are the leaders of 10-million-member Ktons, are all level tens. The rest of our current 127 level tens are Ztars."
"That means," I interrupted, recalling my C.I. training, "that they are leaders of your million-member Ztons, right?" To her nod of agreement I added, "And since you have 300 of these I suppose the other Ztars are level nines."
"That's right," she nodded, "and since we have currently 3,306 level nines, all of the 3,000 Atar positions, as leaders of 100,000, are filled by nines."
"Then I supposed it logically follows that the Deltars are either the few nines who are not Atars or all eights."
"Yes," she said, "since there are some 39,000 level eights we have more than enough to fill the remaining 30,000 Deltar positions and the rest are Gamma leaders."
"But since there are 300,000 Gamar positions," I surmised, "the rest must be filled by level sevens." I paused for a moment to let a nagging thought come to the surface of my mind. "Okay," I went on, "maybe you can tell me what was the youngest age that anyone ever demonstrated nine– or ten-level awareness."
"I'll have to ask C.I., Carol responded and began talking into her mib. After a couple of moment she said, "The youngest age to reach level ten was thirty-nine and the average age of all level tens at this time is 107. As for level nines, the youngest ever to demonstrate level nine awareness had had thirty-three years and the average age of all level nines at this time is ninety-three. The youngest age of attaining level-eight awareness was twenty-seven, and their average age is seventy-seven."
"That means," I said, "that if I make level three in three months, I'll be doing all right."
"Not bad for a beginner, Jon. Not bad," she teased, then added, "I'm glad to see you optimistic because it certainly won't be possible unless you first believe you can do it."
"We'd better get over to the 3rd and 4th triads now so you can meet your younger brother and sister," Carol added.
"Will I be taking someone else's place? I mean, don't they already have an older brother?" I asked.
"He's gone already," Carol assured me. "He was my previous Alpha mate, but he has gone to another Delta to complete an Alpha there."
I realized that I hadn't asked Carol about her previous Alpha mate before because I had felt guilty about the possibility of my displacing someone. Then, when I got to know Carol better, I felt little stirrings of jealousy when I thought about someone else preceding me as her mate. Now I checked my mind carefully and found few remnants of either guilt or Jealousy, so I asked her if she didn't miss him.
"Not really," she – replied. "You see, we share almost identical soul notes, so I can reach out to him telepathically anytime I wish. I'm happy to know that he is as pleased with his new Alpha mate as I am with you."
"But I thought your telepathy was very limited," I said, puzzled at her apparent ability to reach out clear to another Delta.
"You'll find, Jon, that it's ever so much easier to communicate telepathically with those whose soul notes are close to your own. Take Steve, for example. His soul note is very different from mine, so I would have to work hard to receive from him even as far as across the lake. However, the closer the soul note vibration, the easier it is to communicate and the greater the distance your message can carry to that person."
"That sounds reasonable," I responded, then added, "Tell me, how did there happen to be an opening in another Alpha just when I arrived? Did someone die?"
"Oh, no," she assured me. "There haven't been any deaths in the 7th triad for over three years. However, frequently someone will volunteer to work on Micro Island for a few months. That will often leave an Alpha either one or two short."
"What kind of work do they volunteer for out there?"
"We offer our services as Personal Evolution tutors," she replied. "Some of their children, as well as a few adults, seek our services."
"If those on Micro Island are 'similar to micro man of the 20th century," I said, "don't you run some risks visiting there?"
"Yes, we do," she admitted. "At least, those of us who have not yet reached the higher levels of awareness do. You see, it's no problem for a level nine or ten to cope with an attacker, a robber, or an assassin, since their precognitive and telepathic powers would warn them and their PK could teleport anyone who bothered them clear to the other side of the island in the blink of an eye."
"That's some way to-handle a nuisance," I laughed. "Do they attack their tutors very often?"
"Oh yes," Carol replied. "Anyone who kills a member of the Macro society automatically becomes something of a hero to a great many of the inhabitants of Micro Island."