The movement of her egg wasn't explained, instead the dialog continued with, "You hear rustling noises," and then suddenly her egg went dark.

Justin: "Ha! I thought that might work."

There was nothing else for awhile. Her egg stayed dark, and Justin didn't speak again. Danika felt incredibly frustrated by her inability to communicate. She couldn't even message…

Danika halted mid thought, and assumed the pose. Her menus flashed up, and she flicked over to the friend list and tapped on add. She put in a standard spelling for Justin, and submitted the search. It defaulted to sorting by proximity, and the closest Justin was Justin the Grey. She sent a request, and it was instantly rejected. To be rejected so quickly, she thought he must have it set to auto reject.

Danika flung a short stream of silenced curses at the frustrating wizard. Almost as an afterthought, she tried Terri and Quin. None of the spellings she could think of for those returned a result in close proximity, but they could be offline or somewhere else. There was nothing else she could think of to try, and her egg remained in a quiet dark place, so Danika resumed her skill practice.

--

She kept an eye on her phone screen as she worked on the old account. She was currently repeating an unpopular quest in the old game that had always given quite a lot of experience, but had cost the character quite a bit of gold to complete without providing any other reward.

If she'd been submitting the account to "Living Jade Empire" herself, she might have avoided the quest, since wealth was counted as well as level, but the job only specified level and asked that it be completed as quickly as possible.

Justin didn't helpfully monologue when his friends weren't around to talk to. Light returned to her eggshell a couple of hours later, with accompanying rustling noises. The only other dialogue that popped up that evening was when Quin called Justin:

Justin: "Yes?"

Quin: "Hey, I'm really busy and can't play tonight, can you put another 4 game days on the egg's room for me?"

Justin: "No…"

Quin: "Seriously?"

Justin: "It's here at my tower, but don't blame me if it hatches when you aren't online."

Quin: "You're stealing my egg!"

Justin: "Seriously?"

Quin: "Well, you didn't message me that you've already taken it? Also, Terri messaged me and said that I should be keeping it warm."

Quin: "Hello? Are you still there?"

A brighter light shown upon the surface of Danika's eggshell before Justin replied: "No, the egg thief has gone offline."

The dialog ended there. The light was golden and sort of flickered now and then.

When Danika finished up for the night, she was pretty satisfied with her progress on the old account. It should reach max level with one more long game session. Four days to max level might not be within record time, but it was not a small accomplishment either.

Since her egg was apparently sitting safely in Justin's tower, she didn't log in through the VR-medi pod that night. Instead she tried out some episodes of newly released shows with the game still open on her phone so that her hatching timer would continue to count down. Surviving until her hatching seemed to be relatively simple and monotonous for the most part.

--

The next morning Danika woke to an alarm and realized that she'd forgotten it was laundry day. She didn't want to pay the extra charges that special pick up times and services incurred, so she struggled to get everything gathered, and loaded into her basket. She showed up on the curb in her pajamas, which made the driver laugh, but she felt grateful that he had waited there while she reached the loading zone.

The day was temperate and bright. If she hadn't been in her pajamas, she might have gone down to the park a few blocks away for awhile, instead she returned to her room and resumed her normal routine. When she got herself settled in front of the older game with her phone propped up on her egg screen, her remaining time until she hatched was 16 hours.

--

Danika stretched and looked at the last "Level up!" notification with satisfaction. She logged out of her old account for the last time, then submitted her invoice through the job site she'd used. Hopefully it would be paid in a timely fashion.

She gazed out her window for a little bit, before glancing back at her phone. The afternoon looked warm with little fluffy clouds high in the sky, and the inside of her eggshell looked boring.

There hadn't been any conversations to eavesdrop on, and the only detectable changes had been in the shades of light. ZipZing had leveled up again in all three of the skills that she was slowly practicing, but that was it. Danika was seriously tempted to complain that the hatching timer was too long, but figured that she'd wait until she discovered what the reward for completing it was.

In the meantime, she decided that the cost of some mobile data and the effort of dragging herself back outside would be worth some sunshine and fresh air. The day rewarded her by keeping its good face for the entirety of her outing.

Danika didn't do anything that would have been considered exciting by most people's standards. She ordered a bubble tea from a local shop, and then went around the local park's paved paths. She stopped again for ice cream on her way home, and that was it.

Even if most people wouldn't have found her outing at all strenuous, Danika was quite tired by the time she settled back onto her own familiar floor. She wrinkled her nose at herself and acknowledged that she ought to increase her daily exercises. She checked her quest timer, and there were still six hours to go until she hatched.

Danika returned to "Living Jade Empire" through the VR-medi pod interface before sleeping. Her egg was pleasantly warm, and Danika searched it carefully for any other changes that hadn't shown from her phone, but there didn't seem to be any. She went over her skill list and realized belatedly that she ought to have tried practicing her breath skill as well.

She huffed a breath experimentally, and was a little shocked when the skill level chime rang in the distance and the Sandman popped up. He laughed and said, "Welcome back. We don't get many who put themselves to sleep here."

Danika replied worriedly, "Will I be logged out before my hatching timer runs down if I really fall asleep here?"

The Sandman answered cheerfully, "Your inactivity timer is currently set to half an hour."

Danika relaxed a little and asked, "Can I watch current episodes of shows in my dreams here?"

He replied with an expression of confusion, "I don't understand. Please describe the subject you wish to dream about?"

She sighed and guessed that it had been hoping for too much. A moment later another thought occurred to her. "Can I dream about what the adventurer who purchased my egg did since leaving me in the rented room?" she asked.

The Sandman shook his head and winked at her before replying, "You can replay highlights from your own adventures, but not those of other players."

Danika's eyes lit up and she asked, "Can I see what's been happening to my egg from the outside?"

There was a brief pause while her request traveled through various levels of processing behind the facade of the God of Dreams, and then he replied, "Indeed you can. Sleep well my dear."