*BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEE-*

Groaning, I scrounged around on the floor for my phone to shut off the ear-piercing shriek of my alarm. My fingers found it and sloppily swiped at the screen until the beeping finally stopped. Did I truly turn it off or just hit snooze? Who knows? I certainly didn’t. That alarm signaled that it was six in the morning, which was six hours before I was capable of knowing anything. Why couldn't I be one of those pleasant people who could wake themselves up with the sounds of birds chirping and gentle string instruments? No, I needed to be traumatized every single day to regain consciousness. Mornings suck.

I pushed myself up into a sitting position and scratched my neck. Why did I force myself to wake up at this god-forsaken hour every day? I picked up my phone and squinted at the bright screen. No notifications. Not surprising. I stood up and went about my morning routine. First was hygiene. Bathroom trip, then teeth brushed, then hair… yeah, my hair didn’t need to be brushed. It was fine as is. Not like I had anyone to impress today. 

I pulled off my green power ranger jams (five dollar sale on amazon, would’ve paid five hundred if needed), then pulled a red hoodie over my head and a pair of khaki shorts up my legs. Good enough. I ate a breakfast of a bagel and coffee, during which I read my Twitter feed. Then I got to work. And by work, I meant sitting in a chair for many, many hours, slamming my head against my drawing tablet until I created something that could be called art. I loved to draw and create and all that jazz. I even had a Patreon online where I posted regular work and accepted commissions. I didn’t have the stomach to deal with doing NSFW (naughty) stuff, so drawing didn’t pay nearly as well as it could have... but it was enough to survive. It wasn’t at first, but a couple of more popular artists liked some of my drawings enough to give me some shout-outs, and now my work was just barely sustainable. Juuuust barely. Maybe I could even afford to buy a toaster for my bagels one day. Yup, things were looking up!

My tablet’s screen blacked out. Oh crap, did it die? Please don’t have, it’d been so long since I saved cause I forgot and was in the flow and it was so GOOD and- crap. It died. Of course it did. Over two hours of work, gone. I sighed in despair and pushed away from my desk, allowing myself to slide out of my chair and onto the floor. I glanced at my phone screen. It was only nine in the morning. Today was gonna be one of those days. Cool. Thanks for the head’s up, life.

Turns out, my tablet wasn’t just dead. It was dead-dead. As in, ‘I’d have better luck with a necromancer than a tech geek’ levels of dead. Which, to be perfectly frank, sucked major behind. Luckily, I am an intelligent individual who backs up their work to the cloud every single night, so it’s not like everything was lost. Unfortunately, I had to order a new tablet. Tablets are so freaking expensive. It looked like actual food was off the menu for a while. I could see my future, and it was all ramen and questionable corner store sandwiches. And maybe a latte or two. Caffeine is a necessity, right?

I leaned back in my chair, considering what in my life had led up to the point of becoming a fabled ‘starving artist’. Was it my parent’s fault? Well, they didn’t discourage my dream, so maybe. It could have also been my decision to move to the city straight after high school, opting out of college. My grades had never been good enough for scholarships and student loans seemed like way too much of a gamble. With no college education, my job choices were… limited, to say the least. Maybe one day I could be stable enough to take some time to learn how to animate and then get into a studio or something. Until then, it was ramen, rank sandwiches, maybe a bagel, and then more ramen for dear old Jae Yie the artist. Each on a separate day, of course. Meal spacing and all that.

Welp, no use moping around about it. My life was what it was and it wasn’t going to just magically change from a bit of pessimistic introspection. I should go out. It’d been a while since I’d gone out and longer still since I’d gone out just to go out. Yeah, going out was a good idea. It’d be a few days until my new tablet arrived anyways, so I might as well take my mind off of my almost-stable financials with some fresh air.

I ran a comb through my hair and swapped my khaki shorts out for khaki pants. Wanna know what’s great about these pants? They’re for men, so they have pockets. Pockets that could actually fit my phone and wallet and keys and the state of New Hampshire and anything else I could want in them! Boys got all the good stuff - and now, so did I.

I left my apartment, turned left, and was immediately at the elevator. I live in apt. 401, which was a very convenient number since the elevator was literally three steps from my door. I tapped the down button and waited. After a few seconds, the elevator dinged and I stepped in. Press the button for floor one and here we go! To the outside! The great outdoors! Make a quick stop on floor three to pick up another person and - oh god what was that. What was that, above her head? The individual was Ms. Tabbert, who lived directly beneath me in 301. She was a middle-aged woman with beady eyes, a sweet-ish demeanor, and questionable tastes in hats. She had words and a number floating above her head that said <Fiona Tabbert - lvl 9>. Just- Just up there, right above the faux flamingo-feather bonnet she was wearing. I’d never seen her wear a hat like this before. Man, those must be some quality wires or whatever holding up those words ‘cause I couldn't see them at all. They were super flat, too. Flat enough that I had no idea what type of material they were made of, plus they didn’t bend or sway at all as she swept into the elevator. Truly a marvel of fashion engineering. I smiled at Ms. Tabbert and said, “Hey, Ms. T. Bottom floor, or…?”

Ms. Tabbert smiled back at me. “Oh, yes, sweetie. I’m headed out to pick up materials for my next project, as well as to show off my latest piece.” She turned and posed, framing her head with her hands. “Well, darling? Any thoughts?”

“Well, it’s certainly… unique,” I commented. “I really like what you did up top, though. It makes it stand out. Like, bam! Right?”

Ms. Tabbert nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, I put a lot of thought into that section in particular while drawing up the designs. I considered maybe going for a more tropical assortment of feather colors, but if you’re already including flamingo, why, you simply must keep it as your centerpiece! Tropical colors would have drawn the attention away far too much!”

My eye twitched. Fashion went right over my head. Wait, did this hat even count as fashion? “Y-Yeah, sure. I meant the words and stuff, but yeah, the flamingo feathers are cool too. And they definitely look like they came from a real flamingo, for sure.” 

Ms. Tabbert patted the top of her hat. “Oh dear, words? Did I leave my notes tacked to the top again? I was so sure I had removed them this time.”

I frowned. “No, there’s no note, I mean the-”

The elevator dinged and the doors opened. Ms. Tabbert fussed with her hat a moment more, then flashed one last smile at me, saying “Well, if my notes aren’t there, then I’m sure my hat’s fine, dearie. Thank you for your input!” She flounced from the elevator, giggling to herself about how jealous the folks at the shop would be. I considered what she’d said for a moment, then shrugged it off. Ms. T. would be Ms. T., I suppose.

The downstairs lobby was empty, as usual. My building was mostly full of older people, so the odds of kids and such playing around in the lobby were low. Ugh, listen to me say ‘kids and such’ like I’m old myself. I’m only twenty! I’m in my prime! The spirit of youth invigorates me! I-

I stepped outside. The spirit of youth seeped out of my body as I stared around the street at the people walking by. All of the people, every single one, had that text above their head. Even the ones without hats. Look, that guy’s tag says <Lawrence Jones - lvl 5>. And over there, it’s <Somale Blaese - lvl 5>. Did everyone have lvl 5? Nope, over there was <Janelle Karter - lvl 4>. What did that even mean? lvl means level, right? So is this some kind of, like, video game day or something? If so, it would have been all over my feed for the last few days. Why was I not informed of this new trend? Not that it mattered. I wouldn’t have bothered getting one of these name tag things anyways. I didn’t want random people knowing my name. That’d be weird.

Wait, maybe nicknames were acceptable? That dude over there had <Finn Karlsonn “Frey” - lvl 27> as his name tag. Sure, it had a real name, but it had a nickname too, so maybe just a nickname would be fine? Wait, why did I still care? It was way too late to get one anyway. Well, whatever. I’m just gonna go to the park. Once I got away from the crowds, people wouldn’t be wearing these floating name things anymore anyway.

I started walking left of my building towards the edge of town. No one gave me any weird looks for not having a name thing, which was polite of them. As I walked, the crowd around me began to thin. Eventually, it was more common to be walking alone than in a line, and yet there were still the stupid name things. I glanced into a corner deli and saw a cashier chatting with an older couple. All three of them had name tags over their heads. Was it a city-wide thing? Seriously, how did I miss the hype for this? 

Eventually, I made it to the park. Today was one of the fortunate days where it wasn’t raining and there was no forecast for rain, but I knew how quickly that could turn into a lie. Still, it was sunny for now, so I’d enjoy the fresh air.

At least, that was the plan, but all the people in the park had those stupid freaking nametags above their heads. The joggers, the happy autumn couples, even the dogs and squirrels. Everyone was in on this stupid name thing except - wait, the squirrels?

I stared at a squirrel who was scavenging at the base of a nearby tree. It was just your average wild squirrel, and yet above its head hovered <Squirrel - lvl 1>. It didn’t even care. Squirrels are the most skittish creatures ever apart from middle school loners. The idea that these cowardly creatures just up and let someone put these name things on them was absurd - absurd to the point of flat out not happening. What else could have happened? What else could these name things be?

I sat down on a bench near the edge of the park and leaned back, considering the options. Some sort of new tech that projected everyone’s info above them? Then what were the levels for? Did everyone give themselves a level? Squirrels couldn't do that. One of the little tree rats skittered near me and I glared at it. Stupid little acorn freaks, ruining my only good idea of whatever this freaky event was. You know, besides the fact that new tech like that would have been all over the news and tons of people would be protesting about personal info leaks or whatever. So that idea’s dead. What else?

I guess I could be insane. Yeah, that’s a distinct possibility. I do force myself to wake up at six every morning for no reason other than to have at least some kind of routine in my life. Maybe all the stress of that plus my bills and commission deadlines finally got to me after the death of my tablet. The mourning process took its toll on my soul, rending my mind inside out… or something like that. I nodded to myself. Yup, insanity it was. Problem solved. Time to move on with my life. Maybe get a therapist or something.

While I was mentally patting myself on the back for unveiling my newfound insanity (which, in my mind, was more of an inevitability than a misfortune), some dude walked up and sat down next to me. Like, right next to me. I gave him a look, then glanced around the park. There were tons of empty benches around and homeboy decided to just up and plop down next to me. Weird flex and I’m not ok with it.

“Uh, dude, do you have to sit there? I’m not trying to be rude, but like, I don’t know you, and-” My eyes strayed upwards. It was the Frey guy, the one with the nickname. Great. If my insanity was to be believed, then I'd just picked up a stalker. This day was going absolutely splendidly. I really hoped that my day couldn't get any worse than this.