The music was muted, not the way he remembered it. It had been loud not so long ago. He wanted to get off the plane and go nowhere, stay where he was and face whatever he had to face. The consequences, that’s what they were called. He hadn’t done anything wrong. It was in him as much as it was in anyone.

Crime was an interesting word. He had never really thought about it. He had just thought that a crime was a crime, just that. There were necessary laws in civilization. That was how the world was made to work. But the world how? The world why? To propagate what? What system was being kept in place? He was justifying now. He knew that. But there was no crime, not according to the law now or ever. He would be cancelled, maybe that, lose his friends and family. That was the punishment, even if it wasn’t wrong.

Wrong. That was another word he wanted to understand. He felt like he had done something that he shouldn’t have done, something he would regret. Or was that just a thing in his head, convincing himself of that because of what he had been told by his parents and their parents to them? The world was a fucking mess, all of its laws and rights and wrongs being followed, institutions constructed like that, for the greater good, whatever that was supposed to be. He was justifying again.

There was something to all of this, following this path to wherever it was going, on this plane, away, even if that was all inside of him and he was just doing it to himself. He turned the music up until it was distorted. He liked it better like that.