Hermit Crabs of the Universe

There was that day, the one day he felt it. He felt it around him, enveloping him in a cozy prison of matter and interpretative information.

Gazing outward -- or inward, as it may be -- he felt the cold and clammy touch of reality caress his earthly coating. It felt odd, almost alien. Inescapable but for the moments when the curtain drops and time expires in the dark state of nonexistence.

It was moments such as these when he wished he could retreat into a haven of pure feeling, a place only his imagination was capable of crafting.

Emotions ablaze, he shone like a dying star, a shock wave of desperation tearing through the space around him. Curled tightly into a ball, he wanted nothing more than to squeeze himself out of his pervasive realm of consciousness...*blip*...and into the singularity of a conjectured after-death.