Heat soaked through his body as he lay on the grassy hillside. The sunlight penetrated his eyelids as he drowsed, forcing him to wake up. "Who left the shades up?" he began, shielding his eyes with his hand. "That's way too much sunlight -" he paused as he realized what he was seeing "- for this to be Earth. So much for the dream hypothesis."Suddenly, he heard the sounds of footsteps from behind him, over the crest of the hill. Swiftly rising into a defensive stance, he was ready for anything other than what actually appeared. He recognized that familiar, balding gnomish visage. "Dungeon Master." "Greetings, Gamer," the Dungeon Master began. "I thought I told you not to call me that," Tommy interrupted. "Perhaps. You tell me. What did you say?" DM settled down on a small rock, a knowing grin on his face.
"Hrm. It was the Prisoner speech, I think. 'I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or Classed! My life is my own.' To which you responded, 'Gamer. For official purposes. Everyone has a Class. Yours is Gamer.' Continuing the misappropriated quotes, I finished off with 'I am not a Class, I am a person.' So no, I didn't actually ask or tell you not to call me Gamer. I just made it quite clear I didn't want you calling me that." Tommy paused. "Damn but my memory's working good. I'm lucky if I can remember that much detail two minutes later, much less two days. I guess that's one of the fringe benefits of being Tommy." "Or of being the Gamer." "Oh, are we back at 'your Gift is within you' now? Going to make me figure that one out on my own, aren't you?" Dungeon Master just smiled enigmatically. "Okay, fine. Let's look at the evidence. My memory is working much better than normal, even to the point of being able to remember the lyrics of songs I haven't heard in years. I was instinctively able to use Bubbles' Mirror, which I shouldn't have been able to do at all. I recognized EO in her Elven form even though I'd never seen it before. I've pulled off minor conjuration tricks. I've got an evil double running around doing Venger's dirty work -" he paused again, seeing DM's expression change subtly, "- but that might be unrelated. That's all that's coming to mind, other than my being here right now? where is here, anyway? And don't you dare say 'somewhere between there and here.' Got it?"
