Standing in the front of the classroom, Mr. Starchman spun in place and threw his hands forward dramatically. "But what... is... ENGLISH?!"

The question was met with nothing but bored silence and confused stares- and in Dmitri's case, no response at all, as he was dozing with his face down, headphones firmly in place. Violet looked up from the front row to see Max in the doorway. "Um... what'd I miss?" he asked quietly as he sat down.

"Literally nothing," she whispered. "That's how he started the class."

"YOU!" Max nearly fell out of his chair when the teacher bounded towards him, slapping both fists down on his desk and leaning forward. "I ask yooooou, Max! Peruse the contents of your wonderful mind and remember the lessons of your elders and what you've seen on TV and other years of school and riddles on cereal boxes and everything else in the world and tell me WHAT IS ENGLISH?!"

"Well-" He nervously glanced around, but only got a thumbs-up from Lisa and a snort of laughter from Ed. "I guess English is... the language we're speaking?"

Mr. Starchman's eye twitched.

Max tried to focus on something else, suddenly realizing that the room had gone completely quiet. Lisa was staring in horror, one hand covering her mouth, and even Ed had stopped chuckling long enough to watch what the teacher would do.

To his right, he heard Violet murmur, "This is not the time for snark, Max."

Max coughed and tried again, all too aware of the large and somehow intimidating man hovering over his desk. "Is it this class? English is this class."

"How-" Mr. Starchman placed one foot on Max's desk, leaning forward even more. "-dare-" He lifted his other foot, now standing fully over his student- if Max was staring forward, his face would be at the level of the teacher's knees. "-YOU?!" he uttered loudly, waving his hands wildly.

Before he could wonder how the desk was supporting that much weight, Mr. Starchman had already backflipped away, landing near the chalkboard. "As fitting punishment of your blatant disrespect of the noblest of art forms," he announced while rummaging through the drawers in his desk, "I sentence you to... THREE STARCHMAN STARS!"

He threw the golden stickers like ninja weapons. Startled, Max yelped as they hit his face. "Wait, really? Why?"

"Simple! It's so I can TAKE THEM AWAY FROM YOU HAHAHA!" Somehow, Mr. Starchman was already back in front of him, and in a flash he'd grabbed the stars and started high-stepping back to the chalkboard, giggling the entire way.

A few chairs away, Ed beamed. "He's so awesome," he said without a hint of sarcasm. "I'm gonna be just like him when I grow up." Catching Violet's quizzical glance, he shrugged. "Why'd you think I wear these glasses?"

Max glowered. "'Don't skip class today', they said. 'The lesson's gonna be important', they said."

"Ohyesyesyesthatremindsme!" Mr. Starchman said in a rush. "Today's lesson! It's time to meet our GUEST SPEAKER for the day!" He tried to make a serious pose, standing with one leg stretched in front of him and arms spread wide, as if about to present something.

Lisa raised her eyebrows. "But weren't we going to discuss the true definition of English?"

"Who cares? This is better!" The teacher burbled happily. "Now, the person you're about to meet is more than a simple speaker, children- quite simply, there is no end to the knowledge he can impart to us! I'm sure we can all learn something from this man's words, especially given his extensive intellect and particularly inspiring view of the universe and everyone in it! What I'm trying to say is this man knows everything! He is our friend and we all love him! I can't wait for you to meet him and find your hearts filled with joy and wonder!"

Dmitri snorted in his sleep. Violet frowned, casting a suspicious glance at the door.

"Ladieeeeees and gentlefolk... I give you..." Mr. Starchman paused dramatically. "ZACK!"

A hush fell over the students. In the stillness, two distinct words seemed to emanate from the walls themselves: "Wait, what?"

[]

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[]

No. No, that would just be stupid.

Zack sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. He hadn't really meant to write his own name, after all- it just sort of happened. Where did these ideas even come from, anyway?

Shaking his head, he began to erase the speech bubble on the page.

"Zack?"

He looked up.

...

There were-

It was-

...

Huh. And here he'd always figured psychedelic hallucinations only happened to other people.

Zack didn't move right away- calmly looking around, he noticed a few things. He was still sitting at a desk, with the latest page in front of him, but that desk appeared to be a teacher's desk now. And yes, he did appear to be in a classroom, and there appeared to be a teacher and students, and they all appeared quite confused, and they appeared to be... cartoons? But cartoons he'd drawn, of course.

Yes, this certainly was the comic he'd been drawing.

Welp.

"Um... Mr. Zack?" a tentative voice asked. Max was raising his hand with a skeptical frown. "Mr. Starchman says you know everything in the world. What's, uh, what's up with that?"

Man, some days you just have pretty normal stuff happen. And other days your fictional characters start asking you about yourself. Such is life, he supposed. Probably.

He leaned forward. "Easy. This isn't real."

Faltering, Max blinked. "Huh?"

Man, I am taking this remarkably well, Zack reflected. "I'm dreaming or something. Simple as that- I mean, self-inserts? I'm not goin' down that road."

Violet raised her hand, too. "Self-insert? What's that?"

Zack paused. "Hm. You kids ever heard of Hussie?"

"Excuse me, Zack." He looked up, and Mr. Starchman was standing over the desk, reflective glasses and stately mustache unreadable as always. "You seem to be under the impression that this scenario is not real."

"Yeah, I just said that."

He crossed his arms, moving slightly closer. "Isn't it possible that you've underestimated the potential of fanfiction?"

Zack scoffed. "Please. You can't write fanfiction about real people!"

Lisa pointedly looked at the ground and blushed. "I don't wish to alarm you, sir," Mr. Starchman continued. "But I'm afraid this story... exists... on a level that you can't quite comprehend."

"Okay, haha, that's sorta creepy." Zack narrowed his eyes. "Wait, what are you talking about?"

Mr. Starchman began pacing in front of the desk, and Zack suddenly noticed that the students were gone. In fact, the room itself was fading into some kind of gray, blank space. He felt like he should be able to describe it better, but the circumstances were a little distracting, so he didn't worry about it.

"Do you know what it truly means to create, Zack?" Mr. Starchman halted, then turned and pointed at him. "To give thoughts, feelings, and motivation to a simple character on a page?"

"Goldangit, you took my answer," Zack said cheerfully.

"What? No, I was-" He shook his head. "Anyway, you need to understand. You've written all that stuff that real people have, but I don't have a real body or cells or anything like that. I'm a teacher, Zack. I know science stuff. And what do you call it when someone has intelligence and character, but no humanity?"

"My ex," Zack said, snapping his hands into double pistols. "Eyyyyyy."

"A robot!" Mr. Starchman declared. "I'm basically Skynet, Zack. And you're the... um, the guy who made Skynet. I don't know, I only watched that movie once and I wasn't really paying attention."

Zack stopped chuckling and raised his eyebrows. "Wait, are you saying this story's become self-aware?"

"Of course not, Zack." Hands on his hips, Mr. Starchman smiled without moving any part of his face. "Just me."

And then the alt text ate everybody or something. I stopped writing and you stopped reading and everyone agreed this was a really awful idea.

But not before Zack jumped straight out of his Twitter profile and beat me up.

The End.