“MOMMM!!!!” Eli screams, as he rips back into reality from his most recent nightmare.

Only realizing that it was a dream, he begins to cry softly into the sheets. This was his new normal ever since he started seeking the comfort of the glass bottle. Inflicted by the horrors of his past, be it from his childhood or his teenage years, both held sway over him in ways one would wonder whether or not he should be admitted to a mental home.

It didn’t take long for the hurried steps of his sister to make her way to his room. A concerned expression dotting the landscape of her face as she coos softly into his ear to assuage him of the guilt he so obviously felt.

“It wasn’t your fault.” She said, over and over. A bitter attempt to help him get better despite the demons that plagued him.

The minutes pass in short sobbing silence before he finally turns to look at her, blinking away the tears.

“Of course it was. If it wasn’t for my stupid, needy, self, back then, Mom and Dad would still be here.”

“…Would Mom and Dad want you to be like this? Blaming yourself for something that you truly had no control over, isn’t something they would want you to do.” She replies, a soft look creasing her face.

Eli pauses, wondering where he had heard those words uttered once before, before stating softly,

“…Never again.”

“I’m sorry?”

“Never again will I let my family be taken from me.”

She looks at him with warmed eyes, somewhat akin to a mother’s warmth despite her young age.

“I’ll hold you to that.” She says before consoling him by rubbing his back.

After he had calmed down, she slowly gets up and heads out of the room. As the footsteps recede from his room, he looks at his watch, noting the crisp outline of the hour hand hovering over the 4 mark.

Sighing, he wipes the leftover tears from his eyes before he throws on his shoes to head out the door for his daily exercise.

3 days later

“av ‘un a ‘ork!” (Have fun at work!) Aella says while she stuffs her face with Frosted Flakes.

“I’ll try Aella, I can’t guarantee anything though,” Eli replies as he heads towards the door.

Noting the dew on the grass as he steps out of the door and starts walking to his full time job. He looks at his watch noticing that it’s 8 am and starts jogging down the road towards the office. The time passes quickly as he makes his way down the road, noting the odd person out and about considering that it was usually a quiet neighborhood.

Before long, he’s opening the front door to a ranch styled office with a wrap-around deck. The inside of the office, being more spacious than the outside let the onlooker peek, looked more like a modern gym than it did an office. Weights and dumbbells lay scattered across the floor on the left side. On the right, there is a lone desk with a couple of simple chairs sitting around it. In the back there is a set of double doors that lead out to the porch, both the doors lie propped open.

“Elijiah the Piercer, welcome back to your heavenly haven of sweaty delight son!”

A deep baritone voice with a small twang rings out from the back. Eli notices the outline of the man standing on the porch, and a cheeky grin slowly spreads across his face.

“And what would you do without me Hubert? If I left you with the rest of the guys you’d go crazy inside a month!”

The man named Hubert walks into the room and slowly makes his way to the desk. The 53-year-old bear of a man that towered at his lofty 200 cm, clicked his boots against the hardwood floors as he walked. He was the best craftsman of the company, as well as the head contractor. Shaven head, tanned leathery skin, chocolate colored eyes, and a smile that would melt any lady. A man with the name of rancher just shouting at you from his features alone.

Both of them worked for the lone construction company situated in the remains of New Jersey’s Port districts. Well, more accurately Elijiah worked for Hubert. Although they weren’t blood related, anyone could tell that the two were as close as family.

“The boys are already over there so if you wanna grab your gear and head on over, that’d sort things out real quick. We’re in charge of demo this time round, but I’m making sure they follow your orders when it comes to placement of the charges.”

“Alright, Pops I’ll head on over there. Hopefully they haven’t done anything stupid yet.”

Eli goes over to the lockers stationed along the far side of the room, and grabs his tools before heading out the back. As he nears the exit, he hears Hubert state,

“I’ll head on over there once I finish this paperwork for the client.”

“Alright but don’t take too long. I’m not sure if the boys can handle this much excitement for one day. It’s been a while since they last did something like this.” Eli retorts as he heads out the door.

Hopping on one of the company vehicles, it takes him about an hour to head out to the demo site by cutting through a residential area. The site is an old 4 storey hotel with walls that looked like they hadn’t been seen in years standing a couple kilometers from the highway. One of the last buildings still standing that survived the bombings of World War Three. The client apparently wanted the job finished.

As he nears the site, Eli sees a group of tattooed men standing around near the safety tape, the outer edge of the safe line for where a demo could be executed without injuring anyone.

“Alright boys, time to get to work!” he yells as he opens the vehicle door.

They all turn at the sound of his voice and start grinning when they recognize who it is. Each face varied in their twinkling delight as a single tattoo marked on their necks signified their bond to each other. The men of this merry company were all ex-mercenaries that Eli had put together. Each man with the wish to get out of the killing business, sought him out to see if they could do something constructive with their lives instead of wreaking havoc on the world around them.

That being said, there always came a time that they would want to let loose and release the pent-up stress of their daily lives. Demolition work was their favorite way of satisfying that release.

““TIME TO SEE SOME FIREWORKS!!!!!”” they all shout giddily and start grabbing their gear.

Eli heads inside and starts marking places they should place the charges. After a couple hours of doing so to make his way up the building, he sets to work making sure all of the charges are set according to his specifications. The hours’ grind away at the day as the laborers set the marked areas and made adjustments to further assist in the explosion process.

As they finish their work and make their way to the safety line, Hubert walks up from his own truck, parked a good way behind the line.

“Finished are ya? Seems I got here in time to see the show!”

“Of course you are, who’d wanna miss this show of the month?!” One of the workers replies with sweat and dirt clinging to his shirt.

“Alright, is everyone here?” Eli asks in a voice loud enough to be heard above their talking.

“Yup everyone’s here boss!” one of them replied.

“Alrighty then, time for the show to start.” Eli states and then promptly flips the switch on his detonation device.

The large audible crack of simultaneous charges going off along the entirety of the building forces the hotel to collapse inward, as if a man crumpling into the dust. Everyone starts whooping and hollering from the magnificent sight of destruction. As the dust settles, everyone starts packing up their gear whilst talking in anticipation of the next job they might have.

While Elijiah collects his tools, Hubert walks up behind him and says,

“Good work, real good work. If only half the guys I hired for a job turned out like you did, I’d be rolling out contracts like no tomorrow.”

“Well if you had any more guys like my team and I, you wouldn’t need me anymore.”

“Speaking of tomorrow, why don’t you take the day off and spend some time with your sister?”

“……I can do that, but why tomorrow?”

“I got a hobby that needs catching up on and no contracts to speak of at the moment, so take some time off to yourself.”

Eli gets up with his gear in tow, and eyes Hubert, wondering what exactly he should say to the already laid back man.

“Alright, I guess I’ll see you say… next Wednesday?”

“Sounds good to me. And take it easy now would ya, I don’t want to hear about you having another episode from Ernest if I can help it. I can’t have my lead foreman being stuck in a mental ward ya know? So you really should get yourself a therapist to get that all straightened out.”

Eli sighs in exasperation as he seemed to be getting tired of hearing the same thing being asked of him.

“I promise I’m fine Hubert. I just—”

“Son, if this is about the insurance, you know your contract to the company covers all of that.”

“But I—”

“Boy, do it for me and the boys. If not for them, do it for your sister cause you know she frets over ya.”

An awkward silence spreads between them as Eli considers what he’s being asked.

“Fine, I’ll get a damn shrink.” he grumbles before walking away, knowing full well that he would’ve had to argue more if he stayed any longer.

“Have Jensyn take my truck back to the Headquarters, I’m gonna walk back.” He says over his shoulder, knowing full well that Hubert would hear him. He wanted to stew in his thoughts for a while.

Eli leaves the area with Hubert staying behind, knowing his boss would want to make sure the workers won’t do anything stupid considering their particular proclivity for pyrotechnics being at the forefront of their minds.

The minutes pass in silence as he walks down the road through the parked cars and suburban area. Stewing in his thoughts about his last conversation and knowing full well that if Hubert had required him to have a doctor take a look at him before he could be allowed to go back to work, he would. The shrink. The god damn shrink. For weeks he had been pestered by his friends and family about visiting a therapist to take care of his particular problem.

He had gotten used to the, now daily, ritual. Wake up from a nightmare, work off the steam with a couple hours of physical fitness, go to work, go to the bar, drink until he got fed up with the locale, head home for the night, do some homework to satisfy the online professors, and go back to nightmares. Rest, rinse, repeat. That was all he had ever done since he had retired from the active service of mercenary work.

After about 30 min down the road, heading back the way he came, he notices a couple jogging on the other side of the street. The white and greyed paint of the houses coupled with the not-so-green grass paired an interesting choice despite the couple’s choice of outfit.

While seeing this, he notices a man with blue jeans, a grey hoody, and a knife the length of his forearm waiting 30 meters in front of them hiding behind a hedge. Fearing the worst, he drops his bag and heads across the street behind the mugger. He searches in his pocket for any spare change and finds nothing.

Gonna have to do this the hard way, he thinks to himself.

As he reaches the other side of the street, the joggers have reached the muggers position. The mugger jumps out, points the knife at them and starts demanding money.

Eli, sprinting towards the mugger, jumps off a parked car and proceeds to drop kick the man… sending him flying back into the hedge. An audible crack sounds out as the man’s ribs break under the force of a 100 kg flying object.

“Are you two alright?” Eli asks the couple as he returns to the ground.

“Y-yes we are! Thank you so much!”

While they are busy thanking him, the mugger gets back up. Despite the pain coursing through his chest, the mugger grabs his knife.

As soon as he registered what just happened, he starts running toward Eli with the intent to kill. Realizing that they were all in danger, Eli steps in front of the couple, shielding them with his body as they back away from the ensuing conflict.

As soon as the mugger starts lunging with the knife, he sidesteps, grabs the arm with one hand mid lunge, and sweeps his feet out from under him to land on the concrete. The man crumbles like a paper sack after that.

6 cracked ribs, a dislocated wrist, dazed, and a shattered pride. Well done Mister Pierce. Eli thinks to himself as he studies the mugger in his entirety before turning back to the couple.

“Call the police.” He orders coldly to the couple who are just standing there dumbfounded.

10 minutes later. The police arrive on scene and arrest the mugger. They go to ask for an explanation from the couple while Eli sits on the sidewalk with his bag resting beside him.

“I was just in the area and noticed what would happen,” Was his explanation when asked why he apprehended the mugger. Once released, he gets up and starts heading down the road. Tired of the usual routine, he heads home instead of the bar to clean himself up.

A couple hours later,

“I’m home!” he says as he walks through the door.

He walks to the counter in the kitchen and starts setting his gear down.

“You’re home early, it’s not even 5 yet!” Aella exclaims coming out of her room with a thick book in hand.

“What’s that, a new conquest?”

“No, it’s something I got from the library while you were out. Besides how was your day?”

“Oh the usual, blew up a building, got in a fight.”

“You WHAT?!”

Aella looks at him incredulously. She inspects his attire and sees that there aren’t any blood stains.

“Who is it and when can I kill them?”

“You can’t kill him because he’s already in the hospital. Don’t worry I took care of it.”

“Well….alright then.”

TRINGTRINGTRING….

He looks at the phone on the counter.

There shouldn’t be anyone calling at this time of day that we know of…

TRINGTRINGTRING….

“Anyone supposed to be calling for you today Aella?”

“Not that I know of…”

TRINGTRING…..click

“Hello?” He asks cautiously.

“Is this Mister Elijiah Pierce that I am speaking with?” A husky feminine voice replies.

“Yes….may I ask who is calling?”

“This is Rebecca Sanchez with Corellec Inc. and we are calling to inform you that you have won the grand prize of the free account and lifetime membership out of the 16,000 entries in the lottery that was initiated 3 days ago on your campus.”

“………”

“Your Animatus will be arriving tomorrow and you can proceed through to the login whenever you like.”

“Alright then, thank you for the call.”……..click

“What was that about?” Aella asks inquisitively.

“Remember that lotto we went to at the university a couple days back?”

“…you didn’t” she says quietly.

“Yup, apparently I did,” he states with a sigh as he knew that his life had now gotten a whole lot more complicated.

“Well that’s good for you, just be sure to give me all the juicy footage!” She states while giving him a look that was akin to a child finding out they got their favorite toy on Christmas.

She looks a lot like Mom when she does that. He thinks as he sets his bag down atop the

“Yesh marm! Whatever ya shay marm!” Eli replies in absolute deadpan while slapping up an overly dramatic salute.

“Oh shut it! That is quite enough out of you!” she almost shouts through sheer embarrassment.

“And what would oh yon missy like to dine on this fine evening?” he says in a very bad fake British accent.

“I want pumpkin pie! I want to be spoiled and you can’t say shit about it cause you won something!” she replies acting like 8-year-old child princess throwing a tantrum.

“Well alright then, I will get started on that pie your High Exaltedness!”

Aella turns on her heel and heads to her room with the book in tow. As she reaches the door, she looks down and peers back at the book still clutched in her hand. The Art of War by Sun Tzu.

Inside a GONE (Games Online: News and Entertainment) studio at the same time,

“The Blood Legion has again begun to wage war against the Ascendance Guild in an attempt to gain more territory. It is not certain how long they are attempting to do this, but it is certainly good to see some tenacity being displayed. Meanwhile, we have Mr. Barbas, CEO of Corellec Inc., on the line with us this evening and he has agreed to answer a few questions. Hello Mr. Barbas, this is Sophie Wethenby with GONE, it’s great to have you with us!”

“Hello Sophie, it’s a pleasure to be here.” An older man’s voice speaks through the intercom.

“Well, I believe we the public are all dying to know why you held the lottery last Thursday for only college and university students. Why not open the lottery to the general populace?”

“Hmmmm, you will have to forgive me because there is only a certain amount that I can say regarding this matter. The reason the lottery was only opened to the college and university students was fairly for the point that we wanted beta testers for our new product that should be hitting the stands later on in the month.”

“Beta testers?! New product?! What new product are you releasing?”

“It’s a project that we at Corellec have been working on for the past few years seeing as Ilyanden, our primary fantasy VRMMORPG, has done so well. The project theme of this is the open universe!”

Puzzlement edges its way into her features for just a moment before it is quickly swept aside with more questions for the man.

“Earlier you said that the reason for the lotto was to get beta testers for this project of yours. Why would you restrict the beta to just the ones who won the lottery and not the public in general?”

“Well, we wanted people that are bright, spongy, and full of ideas while also adding diversity from different cultures into the mix. Colleges and universities are well known to have the most diverse crowd out of any individual city or town. With that in mind, we have personnel attached to every student who won the lotto, and will receive the feedback from the players as they find issues that need to be resolved.”

“But wouldn’t that elevate them higher than the other players once the product is released?”

“It might a little bit, solely on the fact that they have experienced what this particular gaming universe is like. But after all the testing is finished, we will be setting their classes and levels back to none and 1 respectively. Hence the reason we are not overly concerned that they will get a massively increased advantage on opening day.”

“Just for clarification, how many lottery winners are there regarding the fact that there were only allowed 10 students per campus that were allowed to purchase a ticket?”

“Well judging by the last count that I received, it is settled loosely around 14 million students. A fair amount of beta testers if I may say so myself.”

“Alright then, can you release some specifics on what we can expect from the game overall and do you have any lasting comments for our audience?”

“I can certainly do that but only to an extent. The universe is known to be massive and what you do in it certainly has far reaching complications. For instance, if you wanted to be a massive overlord that rules over several galaxies or star systems, you can do that! If you wanted to be a genetic scientist that introduces a new playable race to the rest of us, go for it! If you wanted to just stay on one world and be a hobo, go right ahead! Everything you do in the game, is your own choice, but be careful that you don’t get too carried away. This is the evolution of virtual reality! This, is Neos!”

“Alright everyone, you heard it directly from the CEO of Corellec Inc. Thank you for speaking with us this evening Mr. Barbas, and we will be back after the break.”

The news anchor finishes and reaches underneath her chair to grab the water bottle she always kept on hand. Looking around for her replacement for the next show, she sees him talking to her director behind the glass pane that separates the casting room and the tech room.

Flowing off the chair, she heads toward the back with long purposeful strides. Opening the door, she hears the last of the sentence from the Director, “……time.”

“Time for what Rita?” she asks as she steps into the room.

“It’s about time something new happened for a change. Ilyanden was getting boring with all the guild wars over territory.” Rita replies with some amount of exhaustion showing. “Sophie, our ratings are starting to stagnate as the rest of the games coming out this year haven’t been enough to support the gaming infrastructure. We can only hope that the new product from Corellec will be able to top their previous game.”

“Well it should be interesting to say the least.” Sophie replies with a firm nod of her head. “Oh and Robert, you’re on in 30 seconds.”

The young man standing next to the two of them made a surprised look and headed for the door leading to the casting room. Sophie looks at Director Rita, studying her face for clues as to what brought this on. She sees the look of a woman who has taken to age with grace. Bobbed silky grey hair, hazel colored eyes, almond skin with wrinkles in all the right places, and a fairly fit figure considering her prim age of 64. A very grandmotherly look while still maintaining the illusion of a shrewd business woman.

“I really hope this will change the gaming world, because this is a fresh start.” Rita says while looking back into Sophie’s face.

She sees the bright, young face of the California bred woman. Curiosity and cleverness brimming from her as she set about her work every day. Exactly what a budding news anchor needed when it came to this career path.

“Why don’t we watch for someone among those people who might be able to stand at the forefront of the game? We could interview some of the winners of the lotto and see where they go with it.” Sophie asks with a hopeful expression.

“Well, that might work but we’ll need to get the list from Corellec. Let’s just see what turns up in a couple weeks’ time.”