I yawned.

That was the start of my new life.

It wasn’t much of a beginning but, then, what is?

The next thing to do was to roll over as I found myself entangled in bedcovers. Luckily, I didn’t roll too far as I found myself on the top bed of a bunk bed.

This was obviously new to me as the last memory I’d had was downing a shot of vodka and slumping down on my king sized bed after a hard day at work.

Perhaps a bit of background might be in order. I’m forty-seven, successful, and a major player in software development in the finance sector. The last thing I remember was looking out at the skylight of New York, downing a shot, before turning off the lights for bed. Okay, maybe I’m repeating myself.

Now, I’m waking up out of a bunk bed reminiscent of the military environment I grew up on. Funny how things come full circle.

I swing my legs over the bed and look at my hands. It’s interesting that, in most cases, when disorientated, the first thing you check are your hands. And if you’re a guy, the second thing you check is checked by the hands you just checked.

Strangely enough, the hands that I had known for so many years no longer had the creases that I’d developed over the years.

Suddenly, I heard a sound from below me.

The occupant of the lower bed suddenly bounded up and in an excited manner, exclaimed, “It’s time!”

Now, naturally, I’m wondering what determined the time and exactly just what time it was but I decided to play along because, well, I simply had no idea what he was talking about.

“Great! So what do we need to do to get ready?”

Trying to capitalize on the exuberance of my apparent roomie, I jump down from the top bunk and look at him expectantly.

Not to disappoint, he immediately reaches into a drawer of the cabinet on the other side of our beds and pulls out two pieces of clothing.

I can only describe each as being jumpsuits that look like they were made in the eighties that mated with yoga pants. Ah, yoga pants…. Setting aside that glorious mental image, I seriously looked at the drooping clothing with askance.

Nevertheless, my roomie quickly jumped into his suit and eagerly passed me mine. This highlighted the fact that I was absolutely bare naked. With all the stuff I’d been going through, I’d overlooked this fact. I’d also overlooked the fact that I was pretty sure this was an absolutely horrible and probably alcohol induced nightmare.

Still, even when in the midst of a nightmare, one must maintain one’s dignity so I took the eighty’s looking body condom from my roomie and started to put it on. It was surprisingly easy to jump into and it fit like a glove.( I’m still not sure what weapons I have access to in this dream but if you accuse me about bad puns, I will exercise my full rights as a citizen to demand we use weapons of mass destruction on you).

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Okay, this isn’t a dream. At least I don’t think it is. After all, once the metal door opened by sensor, me and my roomie emerged in our silver jumpsuits into a metallic hallway that looked perfectly normal in a perfectly sci-fi way. T]Nevertheless, that wasn’t enough to convince me that this wasn’t a dream but the realism was starting to have an effect.

“Isn’t this just so incredibly amazing?”

Sure, I guess, but why? I mean, I’m walking around in a Star Trek movie scene that seems to be real but why?

Not having an answer, I decide to simply be silent. Along the way to whatever destination we’re traveling towards, I keep looking around and I can’t help but be amazed. My twenty-first century perceptions about the universe are easily blown away.

Before I know it, I’m sucked into the first year introductory speech by the principle of the college I’m now apparently attending. Oh joy! This wasn’t enjoyable the first time I attended college and certainly isn’t enjoyable now.

Afterwards, after listening to a long speech, it becomes obvious to my roomie, despite my hesitations, prevarications, and outrights attempts at deception, that I know nothing about Chrystom or the state of affairs in the realm of the Elerian Empire.

To address my woefully inadequate wealth of information, my roomie, as I now know by his nickname, Bo, a completely inaccurate nickname for a six foot skinny star wars geek with bottle glasses, suggested I use a sleep induction accelerated learning hyper-active cybernetic teaching fifth dimension technique.

I naturally was leery of any technique that used so many words to describe it. Nevertheless, I didn’t want to be looked down upon this new world. Also, being prior military, I knew that having the biggest cahones carries a lot of weight regardless of whether you’re a man or woman so I had to step up.

Dear Lord, I wish I hadn’t. The pain! You cannot imagine the headache I got from putting on that damnable machine. Sure, I thought I’d get some education in a quick while by jacking up to the machine but if I’d known the pain it would cause? Forget it!

It felt like years, maybe it was years? Maybe it was centuries? Seconds passed liked days and years passed like minutes. I could not tell you which truth was. I saw myself embodied and I felt myself in each classroom. Sometimes I argued with the professor and other times I was the professor arguing with an unruly student.

Seconds, Minutes, Hours, Days, Years, Centuries played out. I had no control over it. It just happened. When I emerged, only seconds had passed in reality. If the prefectures had detected the abnormality then they would have doubtless signaled an alarm but, instead, I merely took off the headset and walked away, possessing a knowledge that could easily surpassed their wildness imagination and I’d done it simply through a naivety of the system’s capability.