Jessica glared at the screen. The newest game, a very popular VRMMO named the Royal Road, required a capsule that cost about 9000 US dollars. Even worse, this didn’t include the shipping fees, installation, and the cost of the game, and it was a subscription based game. The monthly subscription fee was about 270 dollars. She would never be able to afford that. She was a college student for god’s sake! Sure she was on a scholarship, but that meant she had less time. She had grades to maintain. Even if she somehow scraped together that amount of money, she would never be able to get her money’s worth out of playing the game.

She resolutely closed the browser. No matter how good this game could be, it wasn’t worth that amount of money. She would put this crazy notion out of her head. Unfortunately, she was a gamer at heart, and this had been her dream: to play an actual virtual reality game. By the time such things would be affordable, she would probably have no more time to spare to make any sort of decent character in these games. Ah well, dreams were meant to be broken. It was why they were dreams, and not reality. Jessica sighed with disappointment; she had a test to study for and a project to finish.

Oh god, how she hated reality.

***

“Nine thousand dollars for a game system, this is highway robbery!”

Emmett’s eyes sparkled with amusement as his friend complained about the price of a capsule for Royal Road over cafeteria food.

“It can’t be helped. It’s virtual reality. They had to find ways to cut off the brain’s ability to control movement while in a virtual reality setting. You don’t want people to hurt themselves after all. This technology is still relatively new. You can't expect things to be cheap yet.”

“Well… I suppose so… but I still wish it was cheaper. I can't afford it this way.”

A dejected Jessica sat across from him picking at the mashed potatoes.

“What is this, flavored cardboard? The food here is way too expensive and tastes like crap. Next semester I’m making food for myself. I could make better food for less money.”

Jessica threw her hands up in the air with exasperation. The food didn’t taste good, but cost an arm and a leg to eat two meals there a day. Yesterday they had tried tofu with barbecue sauce. What kind of insane person came up with that awful idea? Her taste buds were screaming at her for tormenting them. Even worse, she still hadn’t been able to put that game out of her mind. She tried, but in her free time she couldn’t help but wish she was playing it. To make matters worse, she was dreaming about fantasy worlds with stat panels and inventory panels. Why did she have to dream of being in a game world?

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Emmett chewed on his lip thoughtfully.

“You know… I live near campus, and I have a game capsule. You can drop by at some point and play for a few hours, see what it’s like and all.”

“Really? You mean it? I can? Wait, but what about the monthly fees? Can I play it for free? Where’s the catch?”

Jessica looked at Emmett suspiciously. She was aware that he had money, but she wasn’t sure if there wasn’t some sort of trick in it. It was a lot of money. Besides, being alone with a guy was risky. Emmett was more of a pleasant acquaintance than a friend. However, this offer was oh so tempting. Nothing would happen right? He wouldn’t do anything to her. She knew his name and face. She knew his major and the neighborhood he lived in. She resolved that she would take this chance, and if anything bad happened, she would turn him in immediately. If there was no catch… well, then she would have to tell her friends where she was going.

“Sure.” Emmett shrugged. “There is no catch. I’ll cover the subscription. I can earn enough to make up for it pretty easily. When do you want to come over?”

Jessica looked at him enviously. Ah… if only she had his money, or his particular talents. If only she could be a wealthy genius. Bastard… how I envy you, all those things I could do if I was you…

“How about we meet tomorrow at five? We can meet here after my classes.”

“Sounds good to me,” he shrugged easily, “See you tomorrow then.”

“Bye.”

This was almost too good to be true. Jessica had to suppress the urge to rub her hands together and cackle gleefully to herself. Sure it would only be a couple of hours from time to time, but it was free use of a capsule and her subscription fee would be covered too. Unfortunately, she couldn’t believe her good luck. There had to be some strings attached.