Gage sat down at his VR Terminal and strapped himself in. He attached the Nerve Connections to their appropriate Receptors and then threw on his Visor.

“Please identify yourself,” said a robotic female voice.

“Gage 1016,” he replied impatiently.

“Welcome back, Gage, to Perfect Dimension,” replied the voice. He felt the familiar tingling across his body as the game input itself throughout his nervous system. He momentarily lost consciousness, and then…

“Surprise, surprise… the Graceful Gage is back at it again,” said a sardonic voice in his ear.

“Stuff it, Charis, you play this game just as much as I do,” Gage retorted.

“Well at least I’m still a college bum,” she countered. “You graduated two years ago!”

“Yeah, yeah, just get back to Town and let’s see about this deal.”

The “Town” Gage referred to spread out around him as far as the eye could see – a massive, futuristic metropolis complete with flying cars and all manner of flashing lights and blinking signs. Perfect Dimension had been out for almost twenty years now, and with each patch the game became more elaborate and detailed. Even now, well beyond his one-thousandth login, he still marveled at how life-like this game really was.

Presently, Gage stood atop one of the many Entry Points that dotted Town, a floating platform on which all users spawned once they had logged in. He reached for a small circle in his belt and dropped it onto the metal floor below him. Almost instantaneously, the circle grew to about four feet in diameter. He stepped onto the circle and began to fly down towards the city below, the wind ruffling his already messy brown hair. He came to a stop at a comparatively older clock tower ornamented by a ring of gargoyles. Just as he landed, a girl emerged from behind one of the stone beasts, her neon pink hair contrasting violently with the chiseled gray.

“Gage, that jacket still looks ridiculous,” Charis said, eyeing it with disapproval. He grunted as he returned the floating disc back to his belt. Compared to his plain black leather jacket and jeans, Charis looked appropriately futuristic in a silver body suit with bright blue lines patterned up and down her limbs. Lights moved incessantly along the lines like cars on a highway.

“How long until they arrive?” asked Gage.

“They’ll be here any second, just be –”

She was interrupted by an electrical hiss followed by a continuous hum. A bright white portal split the air off to their side, and out of it emerged a man dressed in an all-black suit. “Greetings, players,” he said as he approached them. “We don’t have much time, so let’s get through this process right away.”

Charis and Gage exchanged looks. “You sure you want to do this?” she asked pointedly.

“Yeah, I’m sure. I’m not exactly contributing a whole lot Out There.”

The suited man didn’t wait for them to discuss it any further: he raised a pistol and aimed at Gage. “You might feel some initial discomfort…”

Gage heard the trigger click, and then his entire world was pain. He lasted for two seconds before blacking out.

…

“Gage?” He could feel a pair of hands trying to shake him awake. “Gage, wake up!”

With a groan, he pried his eyes open to see Charis’s worried face framed by that absurd pink hair. His body tingled all over in a way that wasn’t unlike the initial log-in sequence; except now it felt… amplified.

“How do you feel?” she asked.

“I feel… alive,” he breathed. And he truly did. Where before the game felt like an alternate reality, one that he viewed through some ambiguous tint or fogginess, Gage now felt totally at home within his virtual body. The body felt powerful.

Charis helped him up before gripping his upper arm tightly. “You know you can’t go back now, right?” she said seriously.

“Yes, Charis, I know. We’ve had this conversation a million times. Now why don’t we see what I can do?” Without bothering to see if she was following, Gage hopped onto his disc and flew towards the nearest Hub. A massive open platform bustled with dozens of players moving in and out of portals similar to the one that the suited man had emerged from. Ignoring everything around him, Gage rushed excitedly to a raised computer terminal and input a random waypoint. Right on cue, a white slash spun and widened into a person-sized oval. Gage glanced back to see Charis standing with her arms crossed and a disgruntled look on her face. “Well?” he asked.

“You better hope it doesn’t hurt when you die – cause I’m gonna kill you.”

Gage laughed and jumped through the portal, his body feeling more at home than it ever had before.

The pair emerged in a forest of massive trees. Each trunk could have easily been a house, and the canopy above spread out in every direction, leaving no glimpse of the sky. Instead, a sickly green light came from what appeared to fungi coating the colossal plant-life surrounding them.

Without warning, a gigantic spider came scuttling towards them from behind a nearby root. Gage drew his trusty sword from his belt and met the creature head on, slicing it apart with ease. Just as soon as he had disposed of that creature, another bolted towards him from some other crevice, but Gage had no trouble dealing with it either. In less than a minute, he slaughtered four of the beasts before they had had their fill and retreated.

Panting heavily, Gage felt the adrenaline course through his veins like nothing he had felt before. The blood of the slain arachnids dripped from his hands and limbs, and he could feel its disgusting sliminess on his skin. The game had become his reality.

“Pretty cool, Gage,” said Charis from behind him. “So it must’ve worked.”

“Yeah,” he replied with a smile. “Even a maxed out character like me should’ve had trouble with those… but now I’m on a whole different level. I’m really in the game.”

“Ah, well if it isn’t another newbie.” Gage and Charis twisted their heads around to face the mocking voice. A female dressed as a witch sat on a floating broomstick, her eyes staring hungrily at Gage. The look sent shivers down his spine, even if her ridiculous outfit didn’t. “Climbed all the way to Level 100, but still looking for more?”

The two friends remained silent. Both of them could feel an ominous power emanating from the woman.

“Well I have news for you, little man…” she said with a cackle. “Level 100 is just the beginning.” With that, she waved a wand, sending a bright ray of light towards him. Even with his heightened speed and awareness, Gage could barely react to the attack, let alone dodge it. A blinding explosion enveloped him, and for the second time today he lost consciousness.

…

“Gage? Gage where are you?” thundered Charis.

“Not so loud,” he complained. How could she not see him?

Gage left his eyes closed for the moment as he tried to process what had just happened. What kind of attack had that witch used? It wasn’t anything he’d ever seen before, but at least he wasn’t in any kind of pain. And was she serious when she said Level 100 was just the beginning? It had taken him years to max out his character. In any case, he wouldn’t be able to answer those questions just lying there. Gage gave his head a shake and then opened his eyes. “What the…?”

Where before massive trees towered over him, now a pair of gigantic silver legs took up his entire vision. His eyes followed the legs up the familiar blue lines all the way to Charis’s face, which swiveled back and forth frantically as she looked for her friend. It seemed odd to see her from this angle; he could only see her chin and nostrils. When she took a step across the root she and Gage shared, the vibrations forced him to brace himself against previously tiny grooves in the tree’s bark.

“Gage where are you?”

“I’m right here, down by your feet,” he called, trying to speak both physically and via their private messaging network. Neither succeeded in getting her attention, so Gage rose to his feet and reached for his disc – but it was missing. In fact, all of his items were gone – he only had the clothes on his back! Had the witch stolen his inventory? He didn’t have long to curse his bad luck when it turned even worse.

Despite her efforts to find Gage, Charis failed to realize how dangerously close to him she really was. She took a step towards him, not realizing that her raised boot posed a real and immediate threat to her friend. For the tiny Gage down below, her silver footwear looked like a skyscraper crashing towards him. He had time to raise his arms and scream before she put her foot down.