He looks at Sprout’s empty stool. A fresh high score blinks on the Mortal Kombat 4 screen: .
He pauses.
“The back end of reality. Every arcade cabinet is a door. Every high score is a leash. The Plugin rewrites the player into the game. You’re not playing Mortal Kombat anymore, champ. You are the ROM.” arcade plugin
“You plugged in,” she says. “Stupid move.” He looks at Sprout’s empty stool
“Lame,” Leo mutters, kicking the side panel. The machine whirs to life. A pixelated face forms on the screen—his own face, but older, wearier, with flickering static for eyes. “The back end of reality
He shoves it in.
“Boss enemy,” Sprout says, tossing him a second light gun. “The Devourer. It’s what happens when a player forgets to logout. It feeds on quarter-fed souls.”