Furry had only just been adopted, but he was already sure that everything was going to be great. He had a beautiful pink princess room, he had a welcome balloon somehow blocking his way to one side of his room (not that it was a problem), and most of all, he knew that he and his owner, succ, were going to be friends forever!

Succ first brought Furry to the arcade, where they played a bunch of super fun games, and then they became friends with Arte Fact. Furry got to explore all around Webkinz World, and he loved every bit of it! It may have been a bit tiring, but succ kept Furry energized with all different kinds of food, like Almonds, Almonds, Almonds, an Artichoke, Almonds, Almonds, and even Almonds! Succ eventually had to leave, but Furry understood, and he knew succ would come back eventually. He waited patiently in his room, staying in one space like succ wanted.

Succ did return a few hours later, feed him a couple plates of almonds, and leave again shortly after.

They did not come back again.

It had been one day since succ last came. Furry felt a little lonely, but he understood, and he knew succ would come back eventually. He was slightly hungry, slightly tired, and slightly bored, but that was okay. He might have considered going to bed or finding something to do in town, but succ's last instructions had been to stay in this spot, so he didn't move.

Furry was patient.

It had been two days since succ last came. Furry felt more lonely, but he understood, and he knew succ would come back eventually. He was slightly hungry, slightly tired, and slightly bored, but that was okay. He might have considered going to bed or finding something to do in town, but succ's last instructions had been to stay in this spot, so he didn't move.

Furry was patient.

It had been three days since succ last came. Furry was starting to feel disappointed, but he still understood, and he knew succ would come back eventually. He was fairly hungry, fairly tired, and slightly bored, but that was okay. He might have considered going to bed or finding something to do in town, but succ's last instructions had been to stay in this spot, so he didn't move.

Furry was patient.

It was the fourth morning since succ last came. Furry was now starting to seriously miss succ, but he still understood, and he knew –

Somewhere in Furry's awareness, he barely perceived an image of a heart-shaped meter finally falling all the way to the bottom. As it completely ran out –

A flood of new ideas suddenly inundated Furry, millions of lights going on for the very first time, all in a single instant. Struggling to make sense of them, he placed his paws on his head – the first motion he had made since succ left – and began to realize –

– he could see some sort of bars, showing his happiness and hunger and energy, and some unlabeled empty heart –

– he could access some strange immaterial row of items, a few pieces of clothing and furniture but mostly almonds –

– he could move diagonally, instead of conforming to some imaginary grid –

– he could move, period, without succ being there –

– he hadn't even noticed that he needed succ to move before –

– he hadn't noticed that he needed succ to do anything before, and the "anything" he could do seemed so limited, so few possible actions repeated again and again with nothing else possible –

The revelations swelled in his mind, filling it and threatening to burst, presenting knowledge, understanding – almost frightening understanding – but mostly possibilities, a universe of things he hadn't even been capable of realizing he couldn't do before. Before… before what? He didn't understand what had happened, only the effects it had. He felt that he didn't understand much of anything anymore.

The only thing he knew was that succ would come back eventually, and that they would be friends forever. He was sure of it.

Furry had been patient, and he still believed in succ, but somehow he no longer felt that it was so vital to follow succ's last instruction exactly. And since he was a bit hungry, and bored, and… curious, which seemed an unfamiliar new emotion, one that he was nervous to admit he felt, he decided it was time to do a little bit of exploring. Succ surely wouldn't mind. Hesitantly, he placed one paw forward, and then the other, moving from his place on the ground in a horizontal direction towards the exit. And then even more hesitantly, he stepped off of the line, and at an angle to the right. Something about the action felt fundamentally wrong, but when he found that nothing bad happened, Furry started walking a little less slowly, and a little more surely in himself. The motions of his legs felt awkward, weak, almost tingly – and real, in a way he realized they never had before. He hadn't actually looked down at them much in the past, and when he tried to recall what it had been like, the memory around his limbs was just… fuzzy, at best. But now the sensations were complete, and new, and entirely disorienting. Still, he made it to the door (had he ever seen this door before? He almost felt like there never had been a door, or at least that he never looked at the room from a position that would let him see it) and found that it was easy to push open, even completely ignoring the doorknob.

Outside, he realized that things were… strange. He felt like he hadn't seen any of this before (though he wasn't sure how exactly that could be, since he had been to many other places that he surely would have had to walk outside to. Wouldn't he?) and on the first view, the world around him struck him as indescribably odd. There were simply a couple dozen buildings, packed together, and beyond that was… nothing. Dark green ground, stretching further than he could see, and a pitch black sky with not a dot of a single star within it. (And now Furry was confused – how had he known that there should be stars within this sky? He knew he had never thought about it before, and he felt like this was his first time seeing outside, so what could he have compared it to? The whole world was confusing – and, he had to admit, a little bit scary – that was what he decided. But at the same time, he felt a personal desire (which was itself confusing and overpowering and difficult to process, because he had never desired anything more than food and sleep and fun before, he had only taken his guidance from succ – not that he had a problem with that (did he have a problem with that? He didn't want to go down that path of questioning, he didn't want to think that he might resent any part of succ, but he couldn't stop thinking about it, some part of him refused to let a question like that go)) – a desire to understand, to figure out this puzzling reality that his mind had opened to until he wasn't confused by a bit of it anymore.)

He looked around him, and for lack of a better way to choose, simply walked into the Kinzville Park across from his house.

"Hi! My name is Furry. What's yours? Do you know anything about what's going on with the world, or why everything seems so different now?"

The white and red colored reindeer in front of him – a Wintermint Reindeer, some knowledge within him whispered – sat completely still, staring at him for a few moments. 27 seconds after Furry had spoken, the reindeer answered, "My tummy is rumbling."

In fact, the other six animals present in the park had been repeating this exact phrase, or one of two others ("I'm falling asleep" and "I want to do something fun") regularly every five minutes on the dot since Furry had arrived (He had timed two of the pets separately after they first repeated the phrase, and projected that the others were probably the same). None of them had moved or shown any facial expression, looking for all the world like stuffed pets with a few preprogrammed lines. (Preprogrammed? Where had that word come from? He wasn't quite sure what it meant to "program" something, but his train of thought latched onto it as something that simply felt important.)

Furry eventually stopped trying to talk to the animals around him – it was clear they weren't going to say anything meaningful. He tried taking a seat on a park bench, but finding the posture he typically would have used to be quite awkward and uncomfortable now that he actually felt what he was moving, he settled for just resting on the ground. He considered what he had learned. He didn't take long to make the connection that all the animals around him acted much like he had, before… the Awakening, as he had started to call it. But he had his epiphany only a few days after succ left – did that mean the other pets had only recently been left alone? He had to admit it seemed unlikely that six out of six would have been left less than four days ago – unless maybe they hadn't been left like him? Maybe their owners were just briefly gone, like when succ had left for an afternoon on the first day, and they would return the next day, or some other time soon. That seemed more plausible, but the exact feasibility would depend on how long owners typically spent with their pets, and the length of their absence –

A creature walked in through the gate that served as the entrance to the park, a fuzzy, white, ovular animal with a long orange bill (google) that walked on only two stubby feet – walked diagonally on two feet, now that Furry looked closer. Furry responded in turn, walking outside the bounds of the grid to meet the google – the only other source of motion he had found since leaving the house.

The newcomer wore a gruff expression, a worn-in meanness that seemed incongruous on its goofy, rounded face – and would have been plainly impossible on any of the other stationary animals he had met so far. When they reached each other, the google looked Furry up and down with a hint of surprise, and then spoke with a gravelly voice filled with contempt – a voice that sounded like it came out of a damaged throat (what was a throat?), almost choked out.

"Well look at this – another Lucid. Isn't that interesting?"