2039: Glitch

Mark woke up one Saturday afternoon on the dorm lounge's couch, with a cramp somewhere in his spine. He groaned, then fumbled for the Talisman gaming pad he'd fallen asleep with. He couldn't remember if he'd finally earned enough gold pieces for that new spear. He put the gaming pad onto the coffee table, knocking aside a soda can, and flopped his sandaled feet down onto the filthy carpet. Something felt slightly wrong about that. Really should've gone back to his room last night, this morning, whenever he'd quit playing. He walked down the hall, feeling his chest bounce and his grass skirt sway around his hips. He wasn't awake enough to process any of that until the thick rudder-tail behind him banged into a wall.

Mark shrieked, and the high pitch of his voice only made him more startled. He sounded exactly like Lakani, his character in Thousand Tales.

He heard someone running closer and he bounded toward his dorm room to hide. Too late! Flynn stared at him, saying, "Mark! What's wrong?"

"What do you mean, what's wrong? This!"

Flynn blinked. "Your lack of hygene?"

Mark tugged at the grass skirt that had replaced his jeans. He tried not to think about the overly full pair of coconut shell halves tied ridiculously around his chest. "Did you put this on me? Did you slip me drugs or something?"

Flynn backed away, saying, "Maybe someone did. You're not making any sense, man. Go back to sleep."

Yeah. That was probably a good idea. It wasn't even a nightmare he was having, exactly, just weirdness. Mark plodded back into his room and started to shut the door.

A dragon peeked in and held it open. He held one claw to his muzzle, then handed over Mark's gaming pad. "Ssh. You're Mark, right? You forgot your Talisman. There was a glitch last night while you were playing, and... you're probably gonna want to join our Full Immersion Club. See, only we people who got hit by the glitch can see it on anyone else."

Mark looked himself over, shuddered, and sighed. "Ludo must be hacking reality and finding out we're characters in a story or something."