“Ooohhhh, I don't llllike thisssss parttttt,” Wailed Argyle, his words once again slowing and stretching.

“What’s happening to Argyle?”

“Lag. He's in a deep dive capsule somewhere. I'm not sure how he's even experiencing this. We gotta keep going.” I felt a snap and a shift in perspective. We were still walking through our gray, formless void, but now there was nothing behind us.

The fast paced, adrenaline soaked buzz of cyberpunk 2337 faded behind us replaced with a disembodied calm. Holding on to my friends, we glided forward.

In the distance, I could see two points of light. After our last time being here, I guessed that one of those points of light had to be the way back to Endless Adventure Online and the other... Well, that would be the way into whatever other program was active on this device. Without Fez, there wasn’t any way of telling which was which. Unless...

“Kara, can you use your Hacking Skill to direct us?”

“I can try.” Her words were flat, lifeless. Like an ancient text to speech program with no emotion or inflection. “One leads to a program called Mega Home Space. The other is Endless Adventure Online.”

“I have an idea. Take us to Mega Home Space.”

“Whhhaaaaat?” said Argyle.

“Why?” asked Kara.

“Trust me,” I said.

It seemed like minutes and at the same time years before we faded into an ultra-modern living room decorated in bright, friendly colors.

Looking at my friends, they seem to be replaced with cartoonish caricatures; floating bobbleheads without legs.

“Where is this place? It’s scary,” said Argyle, inspecting his fingerless, nobby hands.

“You don't recognize it?” asked Kara.

“No.”

“This is the home screen from Mega Home Space. You know, the VR social media platform.”

“Oh, my girlfriend used to love this place. Ex-girlfriend.I’ve been using Instinct Pic and I used to stream on Spasm instead. I thought this one was for rich housewives to trade diet tips and businessmen who just want to pose with giant virtual fish all day.”

“I mean, it is,” said Kara. “But it's also a good source for news, fashion, all kinds of stuff. Just look.” She turned to a window.

As she pulled apart the curtains, a screen popped up showing news broadcasts. The image resolved itself into a large 3D rendering of an empty news desk. No one was sitting at it. Underneath the desk was an endless scroll of text saying simply, “If you can read this, run. Get away from the city.Avoid the technology. Run!!!”

“That's a joke right?” said Argyle. “They wouldn't put that on the news.”

Kara tapped on to the next channel. A haggard and wild-eyed looking news woman with madly disheveled hair sat behind another desk.

“The advertising blimps are now cutting across outlying communities. The drone billboards are everywhere. If you are listening to this, get away. Hide. Nowhere is safe.” The view cut to scenes from Tokyo and Dubai of people just lying on the street with dumb smiles on their face as screens played endless advertisements. “It's everywhere. The virtual immersion through bluetooth or wireless VR technology is in every city, every country, everywhere around the world and people are dying.” It cut to scenes of people with dried, cracked lips sitting with idiotic smiles on their faces. Dried, bloated tongues sticking out of the side of passenger's mouths as they lay in some train station somewhere in the world.

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

“We're going to leave this broadcast on repeat but if you can get away, get away from technology. It's everywhere. It's everywhere. Get as far into the forest, into the hinterlands as you can. No place is safe.”

The view cut to the Golden Gate Bridge, a pile up of cars spanned end to end. “The roads aren't safe.” The woman said. “Nowhere is safe. Just go. Leave. Run if you have to. Just avoid the advertisements.” The broadcast flickered and reset. The message repeated and we stared at it, dumbstruck.

“The Golden Gate Bridge,” said Argyle. “That was San Francisco. My sister!”

I put my hand on his shoulder. “Yeah, man. It was. The game wasn’t a flop. Its just...”

“But, but, that means...”

“We still don't know what it means,” I said. “Look, we've got each other, right? That’s what matters right now.” The emphatic red warning about dehydration flashed in the corner of my eye. “We've got each other and that's all that matters.”

“But that's not all that matters. My sister matters, Goddamnit! You two only have a day to live before you die of dehydration like those people.” He pointed at the screen as the desiccated bus riders flashed up on screen. “That’s what you're going to be in a few days and then I'm going to be all alone. I'm gonna be all alone!” he yelled, tears streaming down his face. He started to hyperventilate, “I’m gonna be all alone.”

“Shouldn't the system have whammied him by now? Does social media even have mental health protocols?”

“It all matters!” yelled Argyle, falling to the floor. “I’m going to be alone. And it all matters.”

Kara and I just stood there, watching him. Knowing that he was right. He had been so happy just a few days earlier, when we we're on track to pay for his sister's treatment. He didn't deserve this. Any of it. I was a bastard for shattering his illusions, taking him out of the comfortable tavern he had been in for so long. But what could I do? Is it better to let him sleep or wake him up? What really is freedom at the end of the world?

What is freedom at the end of the world? I had been trapped in this game for what felt like weeks. The world outside was not much better, and yet it was real. It would go on. I would live. I would grow. I would die. Kara would be by my side.

Freedom isn't a thing out there. Some magical ability to make the world different than what it is. Freedom is just the ability, in this moment, to make a choice. Freedom is being present, focusing, noticing what's going on. Paying attention. I had been paying attention. I had been paying attention to what was going on in the world, even though I didn't want to. I had been paying attention to the advertisements. To what they meant to show me and what they didn't mean to show me. In this moment, I knew one of them had told me the way to get out.

I opened up a trade window to Argyle and put all of my equipment in it. All of my money. Anything the system would let me put in. Argyle looked up at me.

“What are you doing? You're not going to buy me off by just giving me things. A lot of things. What are you doing?”

“Argyle.” Tears started streaming down my face. “I’m gonna do everything I possibly can to find your sister.”

“What do you mean, bro?”

“I'm in Santa Cruz. She's in San Francisco. I could get there in a couple of days.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Just accept it. Take my stuff.”

“I don't understand, bro.”

“Just do it!” I looked over at Kara. “If you've got anything in your inventory, give it to Argyle now.”

“Okay,” she said. “What are we doing?”

“I’ll explain in a second.” Looking around the room, I knew exactly what I needed. I wrapped my arms around Argyle. “You've been a good friend. Possibly a better friend than I deserve.”

On one wall there was a large blue and pink door labeled ‘Live Streaming.’ I dashed through it. “Would you like to live stream your virtual experience, or a real life in-vivo adventure?” I clicked the in-vivo adventure.

Eyelids like sandpaper opened to reveal a dirty gray ceiling. In the periphery of my vision, I could see dozens of icons, a viewer count, and a live chat feed.

My body. My REAL body was aching and my bladder was ready to burst. I couldn't hold back the tide which, thankfully, gave me even more impetus to get up and move. I was in the waffle hut break room in the back of the kitchen.

My viewer count ticked up to one. The name of Argyle popped into chat. “Bro, where did you go!”

I looked around the room. On a shelf I saw it. I saw my salvation: a roll of tin foil.

“What's going on, bro?” appeared in the chat, but I couldn’t let myself get distracted. I pulled the roll off and ran towards Nate's body. I picked up the tablet, and wrapped it layer after layer after layer of tin foil.

“When the signal from this device goes down, your connection to it should be cut too. You should be able to get back to Endless Adventure Online.” I managed to croak out.

The icons and my vision began to pixelate and then began to fade in and out as I continued to wrap a device in foil. “Bro, your feed is fading out. Kara just disap…” the interface blinked out completely.

I heard Kara and Nate beginning to groan in pain. From the smell of it, they were also having a difficult time controlling bodily functions. I didn't care. This was real. This was real life.

I stumbled over to a nearby sink and turned on the tap.

“Small sips,” croaked Kara. “You're dehydrated. If you drink too much, you'll vomit.” I couldn't make my voice work. I had spoken all the words that I had in me. All I could do was grunt my reply.

Kara was next to me, cupping her hands under the faucet and slurping up water. Nate was there too. The three of us began to laugh.