1 Game Start

Damian Lyons was a loner, though not a social outcast at school. Damian kept to himself, absorbed in his own world, where nobody could bother him. His classmates didn't pay him much attention as he wasn't a cause of trouble. Most of his classmates didn't talk to him, but they respected his frankness.

Leon was an exception and took it upon himself to target Damian.Though Leon wasn't a jock, he wasn't one to shy away from sports; no—Leon was part of the cool kid clique. Kyle Reese was an Otaku gamer who hung around Damian, even though video games were what they had in common. Kyle was interested in voice synthesizer characters made for singing. Damian couldn't get into it himself. Too many people loved to push those virtual singers to hit very high notes. Kyle loved it especially and showed Damian, even though the high pitch caused physical pain over Damian's body.

At home, Damian was reclusive and favored his time spent in his room. Damian had his door cracked open for his pets: two cats—a Lykoi named Jasper and a Tortoiseshell named Amelia; then one German Shepherd named Woden. Damian's family mostly left him alone most of the time, but his older sister would check in on him.

After school, Damian saw a package labeled for him. Damian had nearly forgotten he'd been one of many to get the new virtual reality gaming headgear—the NeuroLink Live. VR was not anything new, but a VRMMO was ambitious. Damian eagerly set up the new VR headset. It came with a video game pre-installed into the headgear called Steampunkers Online. It had to be very advanced technology. The installation and updates were going to take a while. Inside the box, the headgear came from as a pamphlet about the game.

Welcome to the world of Steampunkers Online!

This massive world is adaptable to the choices you and other players make with a player ran economy; this world is completely tethered to you, your actions, and the actions of others. Explore limitless skill and crafting system. Will you be just another citizen? An outlaw? A soldier? Will you become a leader of a great nation? The choice is yours—the story you will forge is yours.

The description seemed vague to Damian but was enough to get him interested and thinking about Steampunkers Online; planning his character and what he wanted to do in-game. It said the headgear was streaming compatible. Streaming. Damian had considered streaming video games himself, and this was a brand new game.

The instructions came with directions to set up streaming mode - it looked like it only allowed livestreaming. Damian found it strange but thought nothing much else of it as he set up the streaming mode. The official launch was going to be tomorrow, on a Saturday. Likely to allow anyone else who has it to play together, he was sure of it. Until then, today will be like any other day and he will be ready the very moment the servers to launch on Saturday—eleventh of April 2054.

Damian woke up Saturday morning at nine, ready for the official launch of Steampunkers Online. When he was dressed, he went downstairs toward the kitchen as his mother was calling for him and his sister to come for breakfast. There were waffles topped with whipped butter and maple syrup. On the side was bacon cooked crispy, just the way Damian liked it and wouldn't accept bacon any other way. His black hair often impeded on eating, but it was a good trade for having his hair long enough to prevent too much light from getting in his eyes.

"Maybe you should get your hair cut." Damian's father scoffed at him. His father never liked him having long, unkempt hair; his father approved of little what Damian wanted. Damian's mother tolerated it, but didn't like some of the stuff Damian would wear—such as his black hooded long coat made of synthetic leather. It was Damian's favorite coat because it came from a vampire game he liked that was set in a Victorian-era video game.

"I was thinking about heading out for groceries tomorrow." Damian's mother said, "Which means I need you, Damian."

Damian was regularly used as the grocery list, schedule keeper, or just simply acting as someone else's memory. His memory was sharp, but not perfect; it depended on the circumstance. Dates are what he usually remembered best, but a short list such as groceries he could remember just as well.

After breakfast, Damian rushed back to his room upstairs; he was anxious that only a mere hour remained until Steampunkers Online would launch. Damian snacked on sour candy (his favourite kind of candy) as he continued on the internet until it was only a few minutes until launch time.

It was the last five minutes until launch, and Damian began optimizing the NeuroLink Live to his body dimensions.

"Initiate." Damian said, as the instructions told to do to activate the link. The world faded into light and the login menu for Steampunkers Online appeared. He appeared to be floating—no, standing in the air over the game world. What was really strange is the game did not require a password. Could it sense someone's brain waves to identify the user? Regardless, a username was needed. Wulfsige. That'll be his username… and accept!

A bright flash came, transporting Damian to the city square of the new virtual world he stood in. Damian looked around his new environment. The heads-up display showed his health bar and, above that, his username Wulfsige. Other players were logged on while others were logging on. The breeze brushed gently on his cheeks.

He could sense the environment; the smoke, the steam, the pollution, the nature. The sound of gears moving and steam whistling—a train could be made out in the distance. Everyone appeared to have randomly generated starter clothes. Nobody looked too wealthy, though there was a mixture of those who looked impoverished and others looked better off. Damian's clothes were shabby, no surprise, but he had a coat. Damian noticed a blinking icon on the lower-left corner of his HUD; giving him a lesson on accessing, navigating, and using his inventory and other menus.

Damian continued onward into a shop, not too out of the way, but noticeable enough. Inside the shop, it was clear Damian entered a general store with an NPC merchant and a few players inside. The interior of the shop had shelving and tables which contained items. There were no daggers, or item categorized as a weapon.

Damian watched other players tap items while others purchased. Damian walked through the shop, browsing through the items. A regular kitchen knife caught his attention. The game was advertised to be fully immersive and adaptable on the page Damian read online. Damian tapped the kitchen knife and the kitchen knife's information appeared—a regular kitchen knife, worth one-hundred of his copper coins.

The kitchen knife came in good use while Damian practiced his stealth during a few missions. He took longer than necessary to hone his developing knowledge of assassination, which required his stealth and melee combat skills. The occasional player would run through loudly, attacking anything they could see.

Damian had a few direct confrontations. Many were accidental, though some intended. Damian wanted a good stealth build, but knew that would require the precaution of knowing direct confrontation. He noticed most players charge into places head-on, but his stealth skill was high enough to not be detected—and, too, trained his stealth.

More players appear to have joined the game. Some appeared quite menacing, and oddly many of those players stayed grouped together. This wasn't the first oddity Damian had noticed lately. He had heard whispers of some people not respawning when their health reached zero and says disconnected by their username; or people suddenly be disconnected and never return. Damian wanted to shrug it all off as rumor.

Could it be true? It was very foreboding to hear, and at the rate it spread. Rumors were always common, but nothing like this. Opening his menu, Damian searched for the log out button. It wasn't there. He could see where it should be, but it wasn't there.

"You can't log off either?" a voice came from behind Damian.

He looked back and couldn't believe what he was seeing. The black hair, brown eyes, and strong jawline. It was CodeMk, a famous gaming streamer. Damian couldn't do more than stand frozen in place. His heart raced as butterflies overwhelmed his gut.

"Yes." Damian said, "I mean... yes, I can't log off either."

"Maybe it's a glitch?"

"Maybe. I don't think so, though. I have heard of people being disconnected and not coming back. Especially if they die in-game. A glitch like this, they would have to disconnect everyone and shut the servers down and fix the bug. And—"

"Okay, I get it." CodeMk sighed.

"So I think we're stuck. I wonder who else is." Damian added. He held his upper-lip between his thumb and index finger, running his thumb along his upper-lip, thinking.

A blinking icon appeared and opened itself with a message: user BUMBUM is requesting to form a party. Damian quickly accepted; a new, smaller name and health bar appeared below his own.

"I will ask around. I know my viewers are probably contacting the authorities right now while I am streaming."

"How do you stream?"

"It's in the options, under online settings. Should say stream settings. Though I noticed it can't be turned off."

CodeMk walked away as Damian looked through his stream settings. The system mentioned there were four camera types: third-person back, third-person front, first-person, and adaptive. The system also made the point of the camera being completely undetectable and is only visible to its player while in third-person front mode.

Damian continued forward, with the stream camera on adaptive, speaking to his followers about the game and the rumors he heard. His anxiousness to confront others directly about not being able to log off, Damian used the stream to talk about the issue. It attracted some attention; some people approached Damian. More people became aware they, too, could not log off.

The news spread quickly enough in a few short hours to cause pandemonium; and a couple hours more, suicides occurred. Suicides and murder. The people who died in the game, it made sense now, died in real life. Damian ran as far from anyone as he could, getting away from the hysteria.

The party... CodeMk. Damian looked under his name—but nobody's name was there.