Humans have always been prone to violence. In the year 2101 a war broke out to end all wars. Due to the scarcity of natural resources brought about by climate change and other forces the entire world was involved. It was a tragedy that consumed the lives of millions. Unfortunately, some countries went to any length necessary to ensure their victory which led to nuclear devices and other weapons of mass destruction being unleashed across the globe. Thankfully shortly after the nukes were dropped a ceasefire was called and all nations stopped the war though it was at the cost of almost 3/4 of the world's population. Now almost 200 years later humans are concentrated in central hub towns and the areas between them are nothing more than a wasteland whether it be due to lack of resources or radiation poisoning from when the nukes were dropped. In the years following the war all governments under a new global alliance had the populations microchipped for both their safety and protection as well as to keep track of them. While some people resisted at first The microchip was used for everyday things such as banking, food allowances, health care and most importantly internet access. Due to the new global economy and everyone working together advances have been made in medical, technology, resource production, and of course entertainment. As the initial war was brought about by lack of resources nearly everything has been converted over to renewable energy with a large portion being a combination of hydro, solar and wind energy. Entertainment is now done almost entirely in virtual reality with the ability to be part of your favorite TV shows and movies or take tours through what it was like in the world before the war and gaming streamers have become even more popular among the younger crowds with some video game streamers even achieving rock star levels of fame.

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“...if you haven’t watched him before stick around, drop a follow. He’s a great guy. Other than that I’ll see you all back here tomorrow night!” I wrap up my outro on my stream. As the red light blinked out on my camera I was finally able to relax. Most people think streaming is easy, you log-on play a game and chat with friends and then log off. Simple right? What they don't know is how much time is put in outside of that. Now that my stream is finished the real work starts. I have DMs to respond to, communities to interact with, some days I have videos to scan through to make sure everything is set, but thankfully not today. I see the notifications blinking in the corner and open up the chat. It's mostly just people talking about the stream today, we're closing in on the end of the game and everyone is excited for the finale. Which just makes me think that I have to decide what I want to play when this game is finished.

Stolen novel; please report.

Checking my emails it's more of the same, a bunch of spam people wanting me to promote their indie titles and things like that. I skim through them, a few are of interest and I make a note to send them to my mod team. One email stands out, it's from Cryo-Medical and the subject line is ALPHA TEST. There were rumors that CM was getting into the game industry, though nothing concrete. I quickly open it and scan through the contents. "Dear Streamer, We are gathering a group of high quality gamers to participate in the beta testing for our game. With luck our game will then be used to rehabilitate comatose patients and hopefully help cure them. While this is a long term goal we first need to verify our code is sound. This first round of testing will be a very small group of hand picked participants. You have been selected to participate in our program. Please note that due to the nature of this trial you will not be able to stream or upload video of this test, HOWEVER at the conclusion of the test you will be given a montage of video of your time in the game from your characters perspective and will be among the first to have content when the NDA is lifted. If this is acceptable please follow the link below to create an account." I don't usually play games I can't use for content right away, but this opportunity is too good to pass up. Being the first to have video of the game that until this email was only rumor is a huge help for getting new viewers. I quickly click the link and a browser opens to a sub-page of the Cryo-Medical website.

Filling out the account creation is easy. UserName: Styx Password: ****** Email: [email protected] Reference code: XQEWC4315 which was pulled from the email. And I'm into the website, I skim through the NDA and EULA, no one ever reads those, and get to a questionnaire. It starts off the basic stuff name, sex, date of birth, but then quickly becomes odd. They ask for things like height, weight, normal bedtime, how long do I sleep, do I feel refreshed in the morning. I almost feel weirded out and am thinking of backing out when it dawns on me, they're a medical company of course they want medical information. That seems to allay my fears a bit and I finish the questionnaire. After finishing up that all I have left to do is wait until they send me the download or whatever for this game. I send off that list of interesting indie games to my mods and a short DM to my best friend letting him know that I got access to a beta and while I can't go into details he's going to freak when I am able to speak about it freely. All that settled I wind down and get ready for bed. The digital clock next to my desk reads 2:30, such is the life of a streamer.