You have died.

Theon frowned at the screen in front of him, he died over a minute ago and the game was still frozen. He’d been raiding an orc encampment with his guild when the lag got so bad he ended up dying. He tried his mouse and keyboard again, still no change. After another minute he let out a sigh and was getting ready to hard reboot his computer when he saw a flicker in the corner of his eye.

The screen turned black and white text appeared in the center.

System Initializing.

He swiped his brown hair from his pale blue eyes as thoughts raced through his mind. Just as he was about to hard reboot his computer for fear of a virus, the screen returned to his desktop. His hand waved over his mouse with a practiced motion and he accessed his virus protection. He worked in a small computer repair shop, so it was second nature to him. Everything checked out, the only problem was the internet was down.

He’d spent the better part of half an hour trying to get it back online, but the issue seemed to be with the service provider and not on his end. Dejectedly, he turned his computer off and made his way to the living room of his apartment.

He swiped the remote from the coffee table and flopped back onto the couch. Theon was a nerd to the extreme and scoffed at people who wasted their time working out, it served no purpose in his mind. It’s not like you could use your strength and beat people up. That was an easy way to end up behind bars. No, in modern society, skills and intelligence won out against brute strength every time.

With a flick of his finger the screen came on and he tried to access some online streaming movies and he glared at the screen, willing the internet to turn on. It didn’t work, of course, so he turned it to cable. Shockingly most of the channels he normally watched weren’t working, he flipped through it until he got to one that did, the news.

“It seems that there has been a global internet failure of some sort.” The male broadcaster said with a calm smile on his picture-perfect face. At the bottom of the screen the words ‘This just in! Worldwide internet outage!’ scrolled across.

“Yes, that’s right Tom.” The female broadcaster said, obviously happy about this, knowing everyone would be tuning in to watch. “I want to remind all viewers that were reporting the facts as soon as the information comes in. We’re told that the Whitehouse will be issuing an official response within the hour.”

The screen began to pixelate as her words distorted. “We are told that this was not caused by ICANN, a group with the ability to restart the internet and that the likelihood of it being a cyber attack is extremely high.” The screen cut out and was replaced by the standard, no signal, message.

“Oh, c’mon!” Theon bellowed.

He turned the TV off and made his way to the window, opening the blinds and gazing out at the small city of Laramie. With a population of just over thirty thousand, it had the benefits of society without the hustle and bustle of a large city like New York or Los Angeles.

From his second-story apartment window, the world outside carried on as if nothing had happened. Cars drove on their way and people could be seen casually walking down streets. He gazed at his reflection in the glass window as he swiped his brown hair from his eyes again, a nervous tick. He was average height with a pale complexion, people jokingly called him a vampire.

“Damn hackers.” He muttered to himself as he looked at his cellphone to check the time. There was no signal on his phone, but it at least showed the time, it was getting late. He turned and made his way to his room where he flopped onto his bed.

It was Sunday and he had hoped to game for several more hours with his guild. Bored, he felt the weight of his body as he lay there. Perhaps he was more tired than he thought. As ringing started to form in his ears and he started to drift off to sleep.

He awoke in a cold sweat, feeling terrible. It felt like being both sick and drunk at the same time. His head swam, and his vision was blurry. He lay there for a few minutes hoping whatever was wrong with him would ease off.

Above him, something floated in the air. He rubbed his eyes and focused on it. He must be hallucinating, food poisoning maybe? The last thing he ate was pizza at lunch yesterday, maybe it was the lack of food, low blood sugar or something. He stared back up and read it again.

System Initializing.

He laughed out loud thinking about how his guildmates would react when he told them about this. He was starting to feel better, but still, the stupid hallucination floated above him. He waved at it trying to disperse it, but his arm trailed behind it, so he moved his arm closer and closer. His arm covered his eyes and still he could see the message, he closed his eyes and it was still there.

“What the hell? What system?” His voice sounded panicky, it was just too realistic. Was he going crazy?

He rolled over and got out of bed. Still a little queasy, he headed for the fridge and got a glass of ice water. There in the kitchen, leaning against the counter, he once again returned his attention to the message.

“No,” he said.

The message wavered for a moment its white text shimmering, becoming translucent briefly before returning to its opaque state. He drew in a breath of air, it had reacted to what he’d said.

“No, negative, go away!” He shouted at the message, waving his cup of ice water for emphasis.

The message shimmered, became briefly translucent again before it returned in full. He couldn’t believe he was actually arguing with his hallucination, but if he could make it go away then why the hell not?

He finished his glass of water as he studied it. It was just plain text in a fixed position directly in front of him. Whenever he turned his head it followed, but when he rolled his eyes it stayed there in front of his head.

He sighed, sat his glass down and reluctantly uttered softly, “initialize.”

A grin spread across his face as it vanished, then faltered as lines and bars started to appear around his field of view. He didn’t notice the bright flash of light that shined through the blinds.

The sound of sirens racing past his apartment didn’t faze him either. He stood there gawking at his HUD, it was like one you would find in just about any videogame. Health, Mana, and Stamina in the upper left. There were several greyed-out locations where one would see a mini-map, compass and a few others he didn’t recognize. The right side had hunger, thirst, and sleepiness, at the top center was the time. The toolbars and hotkey sections were all greyed out.

Another siren wailed past his apartment finally grabbing his attention and he pulled the blinds back and looked out at Laramie. In the distance several buildings were on fire, it gave an eerie orange glow to the cloudy night sky. Multiple flashing blue and red lights, police, ambulances, and fire trucks were racing everywhere, while the street lights all flashed red.

Feeling someone staring at him, he turned to look across the street. There stood a group of orcs, each with a warg, just like the group that had killed him earlier when he was playing with his guild. Unlike the orcs in the video game, these were so realistic they could put Hollywood to shame. On their green skin, even from this distance, he could see scars and blemishes on their rippling muscles and he could feel the murderous intent as they silently gazed up at him.