Blackness. That's all there was. And then a tiny light appeared. It began to move from left to right tracing patterns in the blackness like carving out a little space that the black couldn't touch. Light clung to the pattern before they faded again. I observed to interplay for a moment and wondered: Was the light banishing the dark for a brief moment or did it re-emerge something that was there before and still is behind the darkness? How would it be to have only one or the other instead of the interplay of gray?

A blinking red light shook me out of my thoughts. I blinked a few times. What the hell? I need a doc to check me out, maybe I had brain damage or something. I focused my eyes on the light pattern:

You have died and have been removed from the current map of “Strike Force Delta”.

You are being transferred to the tournament lobby.

Underneath that statement was a blinking red button. I sighed and mentally pushed it.

Immediately my surroundings changed as if they materialized out of thin air. I was in what looked like a hotel meeting room. The room was filled with people and cameras. A podium at the front had people sitting on a table, discussing.

Two security guys appeared left and right and guided me through the room, past reporters and fans to the podium.

“Ah, here he is now. Grant Fuller, Double world champion Virtual Rally Paris-Dakar, double US Virtual Shooting Association champion and 5-times winner of the annual Strike Force Delta tournament. Come up here Grant, have a seat.”

I made my way up to the podium and one of the couches that were placed on it. I nodded to the speaker. “How are you Alex?”

He nodded back. We had done this dance many times before.

“ESPN still treating you right man?”

“What can I say Alex, I love what I do and do what I love,” He laughed. Yep, that was our game. And I would not like the next few minutes, or hours, of it.

“Speaking of which,” he started the interrogation. “How long have you been holding number one spot or the VR World Games List? 3 years?”

“4 and a half actually. But you knew that Alex.”

He coughed, a little embarrassed: “Fair enough, fair enough. Always better to hear you say it. There is something humble in your voice when you do.”

No question there and I wasn’t sure if that was a real or an underhanded compliment, so I just looked at him expectantly.

“Okay Grant, let's talk about today’s match. What happened?”

“The short? We lost.” I shrugged nonchalantly. “The long story is: I am actually not sure. I believe we played well, followed procedure, breached correctly… and then things turned south. I don’t know how but they seemed to know where we were moving or taking cover before we even knew. I don’t know how that is possible as both tactics and setup were closely guarded by the team.”

“Yeah, that sure was a blow? What do you think you could have done better?”

“Again, I am not sure. We did follow our strategy and tactics, were alert, our equipment is in perfect working condition. It isn’t like we were slow on the draw or anything. I will have to review the logs and the recordings before I can say more.”

“Yeah, let’s go through the recordings together for our audience in a moment. Just one more question: Are you ready for another record?”

I nodded. “Hit me.”

“Your fight tonight had highest ever amount of credits bet on it. Roughly three quarters of that money were bet on you winning in various scenarios and about one quarter was bet against you. Want to guess the amount?”

“I know the record bet so far was 1.8 billion credits on a Gladiator match about a year ago. So let’s say 2 and a half?” I gave him a questioning look.

My interrogator chuckled. “You are too modest Grant. Today’s match had a total betting volume or 43.8 billion credits.” I heard a thump. Well, maybe it was my imagination but I am sure my jaw had hit the ground.

Pro-players like myself got paid out of the betting total. That number was normally 0.05% of the total divided by the amount of players. Since I had a good agent and a high profile, my cut was usually a little higher than for the rest. A quick run of numbers in my head told me that I had made about 4 million credits. I heard a distinct ‘chi ching’ sound in my head. Holy crap.

Alex must have seen my facial expression as he started laughing. “Okay, now let’s run through the footage of the game.”

After about two and a half more hours of interviewing, which at times felt more like interrogation we finally wrapped up. I popped my console open, ignored the thousands of messages that cluttered my virtual inbox and hit the logout button.