This is the third of the stories set in the Magic P1r4cy setting, where teens pirate magic online and run them as “spell programs” on computers and phones.  It’s fun to read these stories and see how they evolved as smartphones became a thing.

The clock on the radio of your rusting 1992 Toyota Tercel reads 9:06 AM, undeniable proof that you’re late to school. The situation would normally elicit nothing more than a pfft, but not today; your dreams were full of dark premonitory images—of serpents coiling around bundles of ethernet cable, carpets of bugs swarming in unison and devouring everything in their path, and ending with an old-fashioned rave of all things. The halls of your school burst with students swaying to a deep, feel-it-in-your-chest beat. At the far end of the hall, a little blonde girl spun the turntables while she cried. Her face was so familiar, but you cannot place it, even this morning after waking.

You’ve had dreams like them since puberty, but you only started trusting them after becoming a net-mage. Your mentor in the Socialistas cabal had explained how ambient magic energies sometimes travel backward in time, and blah blah blah. All you took away from it was that net-mage dreams predicted the future sometimes. These were really bad, and the bad ones almost always came true.