Gregor Sansa Awoke One Morning From Troubled Dreams To Find Himself Transformed In His Bed Into A Conveniently Compact Media Player

“Gregor!” his mother called from the hall. “It’s quarter to eight! Get up!”

IM_UP_ALREADY_JEEZE.mp3, Gregor played in reply. Alerted now that Gregor was still at home, the rest of his family chimed in.

“You alright in there, Greg?” his father called.

“Whoa, you sound great,” his sister said from the next room. “Much nicer EQ than usual.” Gregor did not reply, though he could have, with an mp3, WMA file, WMA-DRM10 (PlaysForSure) file or wav from his 64-hour library.

“Are you ready for work?” his mother yelled. “Your carpool’s here already. What are you doing in there, playing with yourself?” It reminded Gregor that he’d seen something on YouTube where people had figured out how to play Doom and Super Mario Brothers on media players like himself. He’d have to figure that out, though it seemed to him that the controls would be unwieldy to an almost idiotic degree.

“C’mon, Greg, we’re gonna be late,” came a new voice. It was Freddy, Gregor’s ride to work. “Let’s get a move on,” he said, rapping on the door to Gregor’s room as he let himself in. “If I miss another morning meeting…” just then he caught sight of Gregor’s proportionately large TFT color screen. “Hey, sweet!” he said. “You got a digital voice recorder on you there, Greg?”

“You got a digital voice recorder on you there, Greg?” Gregor answered in Freddy’s own voice, clear and loud.

“Awesome. Hey, for once maybe you’ll be useful at the office now,” Freddy said.

HAHAHA.wma, Gregor played sarcastically.

“What’s going on in there, Greggy?” asked Mrs. Sansa as she crowded past Freddy and into Gregor’s room. When she saw the slim, stylish e260 where her son should have been, she gasped. “Oh, my!”

“Isn’t it cool?” Freddy asked.

“It’s TOTALLY cool,” said Gregor’s sister, who had appeared in the doorway. “I want to put my Spring Break slideshow on him.”

“There’ll be time for that later,” Mr. Sansa said, pushing his way into the room. Right now, let’s just take a moment to be thankful for this wonderful occurrence—this marvelous… Verwandlung!”

“Ugh, cut it with the German, dad,” Gregor’s sister said, rolling her eyes.

“But it is!” Mr. Sansa said, almost crying now. “Marvelous!” Gregor played a video of a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis, and his family gathered round to embrace him, chittering at him with their mandibles and stroking him with their antennal flagellae.

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