Seeing Frank walk in with the giant package on his shoulders, she nearly jumped up to unwrap it. Sadly, the workout and her one hour of study time where mandatory. So, she got on with it, pull-ups, sit-ups, handstand pushups. Then over to the sandbag, she taped her knuckles a little quicker than she was supposed to before making a handstand next to the sandbag, grabbing it with between her thighs. Pulling her upper body up by doing a sit up while doing a little left right routine. At the end, she let her upper body fall down again. After five minutes of repeating the exercise she got off to practice various boxing stances and punches for fifteen minutes. The wooden dummy used on the even days, the sandbag on the uneven, for variety sake. Done with that, she took fast steps towards the swimming pool, diving in once undressed. She preferred getting clean in the swimming pool or in the bathtub/ Jacuzzi. She did a quick couple of laps before getting out. As she wiped the water out of her eyes, she saw Frank was already there holding her a pair of bunny slippers, a bathrobe and a towel so she could get her hair dry.

Walking back, Frank gave her several glances, before he noted "You seem to be in a rush miss. Is the item in the package this import to you?" She looked at him, not being able to hide the anticipation in her step or in her eyes as she said "Yes, yes, it is, but studies are important too, I will not be negligent just for recreation." He nodded at this while he gave her a bunch of papers before saying "You make me proud as always miss. Now the subject is on rocket fuel, it seemed appropriate due to your recent… interest. I hope you enjoy it miss." He made his small smile before giving a slight nod, returning to whatever he was doing before assisting. Grinning, she scanned through the papers. Just like he said they were a 'rocket fuel for dummies' crash course. Whoever said robots couldn't be empathetic, never met Frank. She sat down and the hour was over before she knew it. It was fascinating, from the chemistry of the different effects in Zero G and normal gravity levels, to the workings of no atmosphere, compared to atmosphere. She had learned a lot. But now it was time! She looked at the clock, 09:30, perfect, not tot much time spent on good habits. Now! For the bad ones!

She put the print out on the table, slid the chair backwards before walking around it, putting it back into its place. She took a deep breath, pacing herself towards the package, all the while subconsciously rubbing her hands, grinning evilly. As she got to the package, she rubbed the side of the carton box gently. Walking around, letting her hand slide over the brown package material, she whispered "We will have so much fun you and I, trusting the advertisement you should be the best available..." The package in front of her was much bigger then she had expected. In normal situations they were no bigger than a coffin on steroids. So a little bigger but with no man hood left to speak off. Nothing compared to this, this thing was huge. At least three meters long and one and a half meters wide she had no clue how Frank had just walked it into the entertainment room on his shoulder.

She whispered again "You are a big boy aren't yah, yes you are," still walking around. "But where the hell am I supposed to open you from…" Walking another round she had a thought and looked at the bottom of the side. There it was a big sticker with this side is up, pointing to the side that was not in an upwards state at the moment. She pouted and yelled "Dammit Frank! Get your butt cheeks of steel in here and help me out." Five minutes later, it was in an upright position. Frank said he was sorry, but she had the suspicion he was not. Not bothering to do anything about the humanoid messing with her she finally unwrapped it and unveiled the piece of machinery that would her get into space.

It was big all right. As she was looking at it she noted that the front part, of what advertised to be the revolution in life support POD, was made of three tanks. Followed by wires, tubes coming out of them, going into the coffin part of the pod and underneath it. At the foot of the POD was a panel with multiple switches and a screen. She suspected for people on the outside to see what was going on in the inside. What the switches were for; she had no clue. She would find out though once she read the manual. Yes, the manual. You don't climb into a machine that makes you semi-comatose without reading how it was supposed to make you semi-comatose. At least that was what she had been doing ever since she began gaming six years ago. It might also help that many, if not all, of the "accidents" happening with VR where because of hardware glitches. Not the software side of it all.

This bad boy had cost her roughly twenty-five thousand American dollars. The most high-end POD available on the market. She had to save up her "pocket money" for the last half year to buy it. If it was everything it promised it was, it would be more than worth it. She had done her research before buying it, as she didn't trust the marketing to tell the truth and the whole truth and nothing but the truth. It seemed they had only done minor adjustments of the facts, which had greatly surprised her. further convincing her that money gave you the fastest route towards the truth. They had, lied in their campaign. It was just less than usual, made possible because their product was just good, so they had less to cover up. As they had stated that no one had ever died, by in game failure in one of their PODs. Which was true as far as the internet and the PI she had hired could find out. It just didn't mention that at least three people had died while trying to move the mammoth of a machine of its original spot.

She looked and found the manual before walking around the life POD, manual in hand, whispering its the contents out loud. There were lots of pictures in the manual, showing what was what. The exact reason she was reading the manual, thumbs up for the Ikea approach. The life POD was produced by an American company called CGE, it stood for Comfortable Gaming Experiences. "Americans and their Acronyms, am I right?" she said to herself as she continued to walk around the silver colored life POD.

She found out the three tanks held cold water, nutritious fluids, and a Nano Solution that would put me out and under. It would also connect my mind and body to the game. It, whatever man made creature that was swimming in the fluid, would connect to her body like the old PODs and VR helmets did. Using brain waves, and the signals it sends to the muscles and other organs using it as feedback. Sending their own signal in turn. Manipulating what she would see, feel, hear, taste and smell.

The difference here was that the Nano Fluid contained tens of thousands of little Nano tech that would all help to establish a full immersion, thousands of connections a second. Where the old tech had a thousand connections as a maximum. By all means the Nano tech could do much more than just connect her to a game. Its main purpose could be changed to keep her alive if need be, or provide her with food and water. This was what the switches were for, they were the option buttons so to speak. There were about fifteen of them and all had something to do with her vital functions. The best part was, that she could change the settings from within the game. She could also set a password on the console so that no unauthorized personnel could mess with her vitals. Now, the Scottish Highlands were not known for its bandits. Plus she had a very well trained humanoid that could punch them into minced meat. But she still felt it was a necessity to have.

The screen that was built into the panel of life support options had two functionalities. First, it could give a read out of her vitals, which was cool but not useful as long as everything went as they advertised. The second option was as she had predicted when she first saw it, it could output a live stream of her playing the game. Lastly was the coffin that had a lid on top of it. Made of glass, the letters CGE carved in it. The insides were baby blue, as she ordered them to be, and felt very soft once she had figured out how to get the lid off. Except for three holes at the head of the coffin section, where she was guessing the tubes led into from the three tanks.There was nothing else in the coffin, precisely as the manual would have me believe. Perfect.

Now there was only one part that was briefly mentioned in the manual. It was almost not visible from the outside. The place where all the magic happened. Supposedly it was placed right underneath the coffin, a thin layer of black graphene sealing it away from curious eyes. Curious but not willing to destroy a very expansive life POD she put the manual away. Walked away from the machine of her dreams, towards her room. There she got the chip it needed to play the game.

Hardware and software side of the VR movement were two very different branches of the same tree. Over the years many companies had tried to get the monopoly on both by creating their own life PODs and games that came with it. The idea was simple, why separate two products that where only used in combination? And money. Money was always the biggest reason for anything, the games that where being combined with the PODs could not be played on any other POD. Which was, money-wise, a solid plan. Naturally you had to create a game that would get played for many years, or be able to produce better games than the competition, which was fierce. The VR movement came to an agreement that hardware and software should be separated as the market became to diluted for any one company to really make a profit. Also, people tried to hack their PODs. The noble goal that they didn't want to spend five thousand dollars for another POD that could play their game, became a real hazard, as most of these hacked pods would get you stuck for eternity at one point or another.

As she arrived in her room, she walked to her desk, opening the top drawer on the left. There, in all its glory lay a five by five by five-centimeter black box with golden engravings on it. Spelling out the word Ethereal Space. She grabbed the box and was about to walk down stairs again when she thought of something. She went back to the intercom next to her massive walk in closet pressing the button while saying "Frank could you meet up with me in the entertainment room, I want you to run diagnostics on the early Christmas present I bought myself," into the intercom. It was silent for a moment before Frank responded with a short "Certainly Miss".

She walked downstairs, seeing Frank walking into the room as she arrived next to the POD. "Would you know where the data entry port is located Miss?" Frank asked as he observed the life POD. She had the feeling he long knew what the package had contained, but had kept quiet as to not seem like he was spying on her. "Certainly Frank, it is on the left side of the option panel, underneath the screen. The port to the far most left." She spoke as she took out the rolled up electrical wire and plugged it into the power grid of the house. The life POD had batteries that could work autonomous for about 48 hours after they were fully loaded. That was on low power mode. But why let it run on low power mode when she had a perfectly fine house. Creating its own power through a combination of state-of-the-art solar panels and some small wind turbines, placed around the house. One thing this place never lacked was wind. Straight from the Atlantic.

As she plugged the wire in nothing happened. She looked up, making a small "hmm" sound, scrutinizing the machine that made her abandon most fun stuff for the last six months. "Frank why isn't this piece of garbage working?" She asked, more out of frustration then expecting an answer. "Have you tried turning it on?" Frank replied, while pressing a button that had the words on/off underneath it. "Thanks Frank, you don't have a button like that do you?" She said as the life POD came to life with a low humming sound.

"I do, but I'm afraid this information is above your clearance level Miss." Frank responded a little too serious for her own tastes. He would do that sometimes, giving her the feeling she actually didn't have the right clearance level. It used to bother her a lot that he could be keeping secrets from her. She would spend days trying to find secret labs in the house.

Without a doubt, there were no secret labs in the house but she knew Frank had a lot of information she was not authorized to know. When and if she would ever qualify to know, was still not clear. "Starting Diagnostics of hardware, approximate finish time five minutes," said Frank with a little less humanity in his voice than usual. Another one of his quirks, which surfaced when she let him loose on other electronics. Something her parents probably wanted as a useful reminder that Frank was still only that, electronics. As Frank was working on finding out if there were any "extra's" she didn't sign up for, she looked at the now working POD. The coffin had filled itself up with the Nano fluid, twirling a little in the coffin. The lights in the sides of the coffin gave it a bit of shine, like a bathtub. The combination of the baby blue and the Nano tech that was swimming around in the fluid made it more sparkling than what would have happened in a normal bath.

She slowly put her finger into the fluid. It was comfortably warm, she thought as she felt the Nano tech attach to her finger. It was a strange experience, like putting on scrub soap and slowly spreading it across your skin. Like the rough sensation of sand scraping past your skin. There was no pain, nor was it uncomfortable. As long as she didn't think of all the places those Nano tech could go swimming she would be perfectly fine with climbing into the coffin and closing the lid. Thinking of this she quickly recovered her finger. The Nano tech let go the moment she pulled out. "Better wait till diagnostics are complete," she mumbled.

Five minutes later and Frank gave her the words she wanted to hear. "All done miss, I have removed several cookies, adware and a program that could be used to send out your data through wireless connection. I assessed that you would not need the advertisement of CGE's latest products, nor a way for them to track how many hours you have spent in their product. The wireless data transmitter was an additional option that could be bought but was already in the software of the pod. I removed it as it could become a hazard to your privacy, Miss." Frank gave her the run down with his humanity returning to his voice.

She nodded her head. Nothing of great importance then that was good. "Great job Frank, thank you for your assistance." She said to Frank while getting the little black box out of her bathrobe. she had been standing a little to the side, not wanting to disturb Frank. But now she started walking towards the control panel. While Frank unhooked himself he stood to the side.

She got the chip out of the black velvet, admiring its glittering insides, while she pushed a button that said Insert game. As she did so a little holder that was the same size as the chip game out of the control panel. she picked up the chip and placed it in. Pressing the holder back into the control panel. As she did so the screen to the left blinked into existence and visualized the logo of Nsquared, followed by the golden flowing letters Ethereal Space.

"Alright then! Time for the fun to begin! Frank, I would like to ask you to check on my vitals every hour to make sure nothing is going wrong. Also, make the control panel password protected and remind me I need to ask you for the password." She said to Frank as she stepped out of her bunny slippers, took off the bathrobe and gave them both to Frank's outstretched arms. "Consider it done, Miss." Frank said as he didn't even blink at her nakedness.

Nodding her head, she turned towards the POD, stepping upon the small ladder that made the coffin easier to access. As she entered the Nano fluid, she turned her nose a little and scrunching her eyebrows together as more and more of the liquid surrounded her body. Like with the finger it was not uncomfortable, just a very strange sensation. As she slid into position her face was the only part not covered by the Nano fluid as she needed to breathe. There were also PODs that made this obsolete as well but it was actually less safe. Lying there she took a deep breath, winked at Frank and gave the voice command to close the lid of the POD.

The moment the lid of the coffin closed above her, the ceiling of her house changed into a starry sky in which millions upon millions of little lights seemed to shine down on her. She looked around, and everywhere she looked there were stars. The floor she was standing on seemed like black glass, reflecting all the millions of lights in the sky but what was underneath was not visible. The floor was cold but the "air" around her didn't feel all that cold. As she wanted to make a step, a voice came out of nowhere "Welcome to the universe of Ethereal Space, we are extremely happy that you have chosen our universe." The voice sounded a little like Frank when he was checking on Electronics, cold, dejected, and not very human. Like a message on repeat. She thought of why they would spend so little time on a good and energetic welcome. Instead giving her Marvin, the depressed robot from hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy.

The voice had already continued. "Please make sure that at some point in the coming twenty-four hours you read and agree to our terms of service." Tell Frank to check for anomalies, she thought. "Now, please follow me towards the first of twelve tests to account for your aptitudes within the game. Keep in mind that the aptitude can play a significant role in your game-play experience so please take the test seriously. Nsquared is not accountable for any dissatisfactory results and is not legally obliged to give you another try at the test. Re-test, when bought, are 100 dollars per subject. Tread with care." As the voice stopped talking, she grumbled in a soft voice. "Jesus when is the fun going to end? My lord I think this could be the most anti climatic beginning of a game I have ever experienced."

As she was more than a little disappointed, a black shadow came loose from the black glass floor right in front of her. She stared at it as it formed into the shape of a human. Nothing more than the general shape though. No face, no fingers, no way to know if it had an innie or an outie. Nsquared did not like intro's it seemed. Oh well, so be it. She walked behind the shapeless human shadow for two minutes. Her naked feet making little thud noises on the cold black glass floor. As it stopped floating forwards so did she. There was its depressed voice again, and she didn't know if she made it up in her head but before it talked again, it seemed to sigh. "We are at the first of three tests, we would like to ask you to sprint as fast as you can for the next thirty seconds. Please confirm if you understand the task at hand and that you are ready." Easy peasy lemon squeezy. "I confirm Marvin, let's do this."

The shadow seemed to twitch slightly but nothing she could be one hundred percent sure about. Marv began counting from ten towards zero and as the count hit zero she took off at full speed. The black glass that passed underneath her bare feet didn't give a lot of resistance, so it took a little longer to get to her top speed then she was used to. In contrast to the difficulty with grip, there was no air resistance. Making her top speed about ten kilometers an hour faster than usual. After the thirty seconds passed it seemed like she ran into what was akin to a 3-meter block of invisible jelly. She went from close to 30 kilometers an hour to zero in an instant. Not that she felt any discomfort. It felt like somebody had hit her gently in the head with a soft pillow.

Not even winded by the exercise she waited as Marvin glided to her location, coming to a halt. "Now for the next test please lift this item of the floor, confirm if you understand the task." She confirmed, bent through her knees, her back straight, before she tried to lift the black item. It looked like a block of cement, made of the same material as the floor. As she was lifting, the item seemed to get heavier. She held on for as long as possible but eventually had to let go. As she did, it disappeared into nothing. In following ten minutes she had to hit a dummy, kick a dummy and avoid a series of objects that flew by at differing angles and intervals. After that came a small path that kept getting smaller, which she had to walk to the end. A timed repeat of the same test followed shortly after.

Marvin spoke up again "With that we have completed the first three aptitude tests, which include speed, agility and strength. The aptitude scores will be divulged after all the test are completed." She looked at the shadow with some annoyance on her face. Fun times will come, fun times will come, fun times will… "Now for the next three aptitudes, please look bellow you on the floor. You can either sit or stand for this part of the test. There will be 300 multiple choice test. You can call out the letter of your chosen answer. Please confirm if you are ready to begin and understand the task asked of you." For fuck sake, what is this? A college appliance? Aaaaaah, fun times will come, fun times..." I confirm Marvin." She grumbled as she sat down.

Over the course of the next hour she answered the three-hundred questions. They were surprisingly hard, divided over the whole test, topics randomized. She had to say what came next in a sequence of words, numbers and figures. Do calculations with again words, numbers and figures. State if two words were related, synonym's or could be used in any combination. Grammar checks. Fracture multiplications, dividing, and a lot more that got more complex the further she got into the test. At question 246 and up she could only do a hail Mary, guessing what the right answer was at random.

As she finished the last answer Marvin faded back into her field of view, waiting a few seconds before he spoke once more "This completes the fourth to sixth aptitude, Intelligence, Numeric and Linguistics. Would you like to take a break to either, facilitate your needs outside the game or a moment to recollect your thoughts? Please confirm or deny the request for a break." She got off of the cold black glass floor, rubbing her cold butt cheeks. When she had found back some sensation of feeling, she stated in a much calmer voice then she felt "I deny the break for I have no need to facilitate my needs outside the game," the shadow called Marvin let a pause fall for a moment before he responded. "As you wish," and a dark grey plane like spaceship shimmered into existence.

From her view point she could see that the front of the ship was pointed into a singular spot. From which it slowly got wider and wider the further back it went. In the middle of the ship, two short wings were located that where far thicker than any wing she had seen on a normal plane. The moment the hull reached the wings, it slimmed down again and curve up until it ended into a tail like a helicopter. Without a rotator in it. What she guessed was the source of movement, was shaped like a jet engine. Sitting directly underneath the tail of the ship. The cockpit - or at least a glass part in the hull sat above the pointy front. Underneath that sat two pipes that could be laser or plasma cannons if she had to believe the novels she had read to be true.

She whistled and chuckled "Now we are talking, what's up next Marv?" The shadow seemed to take pause on that but after a few moments he continued in his old and familiar tone of dejected machinery. "For the next test of aptitude please enter the ship, get it ready for lift off, fly through the rings that will be visualized on your interface and land the ship. Please confirm if you have understood the task and are ready to begin." The fun has begun! she thought before responding "I confirm Marv, you know me, I'm quick on the intake." With that she walked toward the ship.

Her naked feet making small thuds on the black glass. She wasn't worrying about the fact that ever since she got in the game she had been naked. Going up to the spaceship it impressed her how realistic it looked. As she came closer, she could see the dents and scratches in the hull. Focused in the front area of the space ship, suggesting that many had tried to land on the nose of the ship. The scratched dark grey paint gave way to the metallic looking material that the hull was made off. She touched the ship, it felt cold. Smelling the metallic smell that comes with anything that was made of metal and not polished on a regular basis. Small spots of rust adorning the scratches and bumps. She kept her hand on the ship walking around it, feeling the scratches and bumps travel across her fingers as she was looking for a door.

When she found it on the other side, she pressed a button that said 'Open'. She stood to the side as a door that doubled as stairs folded out of the space ship with some unwillingness as it seemed to make more noise than it should. Stepping upon the stairs, and hearing the ship groan under her 48 kilograms was not very encouraging. When she entered the ship, she whistled again. Not because it was impressive, no sir it was definitely not impressive. The insides where nothing more than an open space, a seat for the pilot to sit in and what appeared to be a random assortment of buttons accompanying a steering wheel. The rest of the ship? Stripped of every part it had, only leaving the metal shell of the inside of the hull. Also, it stank of puke. This ship was definitely a usual suspect in this part of the test.

She made her way, bare feet and butt naked, towards the chair looking down at the panel of buttons. This would be a pain, all the buttons had named tags, or at least what was left of them. Some had been "completed" with a black pen, and one buttons` tag was even completely gone. She tried to sit but when her butt touched the seat, she went back up again in one fluid motion, looking down.

One of the spiral springs, charged with making the chair into something comfortable, was sticking out. Pinching her in the left butt cheek... "Goddamn game, at least let me put on some cloths before you screw me over on the one fun thing I have seen so far..." Sighing she tried to put the spring back into the chair. When that failed she pulled it out all together, coming out with surprising ease. Sitting back down she stared at the panel of buttons. There was not even a dashboard around it, it's just a panel with wires coming out of the back, going into the floorboards. Goddamn cheapskates.

She began by pressing the button that read 'start engine', followed by 'retract launch pad' and a button called 'air la' which made a good surrogate for air launch in her head. Feeling a slight jolt through the whole ship, the nose slammed into the black glass. She almost got launched into the window as she tried to pull the steering wheel towards her. Pointing the ship into the air. Going faster and faster, She saw sparks coming off. Struggling a little longer she sighs as she is finally airborne. Calming down, taking a deep breath, she steers the ship to the left, then to the right and tries to do a loop. Regretting the loop instantly as she almost gets squashed against the chair, feeling another spring coming through at a rather awkward position.

Once she is in position, no longer messing around, the rings appear. She steers right through them until the rings came faster and faster, and at really awkward angles. In the end, she was happy if she hits one in ten. Finally the rings disappear, and at the same time a yellow X marks the place on the black glass where she should land her ship. Pushing the 'drop landing gear' button, 'prepare landing thrusters', 'slows engine speed' in order. Steering the ship towards the mark, before killing the engine, and engaging the landing thrusters. With a slight scraping noise, she lands the ship and kills all power with the 'kill all power' button.

That didn't go half as bad as she had expected! Not a star pilot in the making that is for sure but kind of capable. Maybe... She should ask Frank for a hundred dollars... Walking out of the ship with a little wobble in her legs she walks a few meters before seeing the ship shimmering out of existence in the corner of her eyes.

"Welcome back and congratulations with completing the seventh, eighth and ninth aptitude test, namely Piloting, Spatial Orientation and Engineering." When she heard Marv's voice, she frowned and asked "What part of that test was Engineering?" The shadow twitched again, ever so slightly and said "A fair question one I have asked myself many times, but that is not important right now, during the flight some parts broke down, if you had fixed or removed the parts then you did good in the test. If you ignored them, then you did not do so well. Can you confirm your agreement that this is a satisfactory explanation?" She was still frowning listening to him. That whole ship was taped together, how was she even supposed to know she could improve on it if she wanted? Still it was not Marvin's fault she had messed up and thus she nodded saying "I confirm Marvin, what is next on the agenda?"

The last three tests! She couldn't wait to be done with this prolonged sense of bored torture. "The next test will differ slightly from the others, it is required of you to sit down and accept the surrounding happenings. you can choose to act or do nothing. Whatever the choice and at what time it is made, the test ends after one hour. Do you confirm that you understand what is asked of you in this test?" As Marvin finished, she couldn't help but feel this time was longer than the previous times. but most of all she was annoyed. Another hour! All right deep breaths she thought, before grumbling "I confirm that I understand Marvin." The shadow seemed to nod its head and said "Please sit down, so that the test can begin." She sat down and everything around her changed. She thought she heard a small voice whisper "It isn't real" but couldn't hear it clear enough. Then it rained.