I ran back to David's room and logged onto my account, and soon after we were both in the land of Ether.
But before I could do anything, I needed to create my avatar (the character that I would be playing as, in the game) and take care of a few other important things.
Inside the virtual environment, everything was black, except for a glimmer in the distance. Then a white square about ten feet high came zooming towards me out of the void. I turned from it, but it moved with me, remaining directly in the center of my field of vision. It grew and grew, until it filled my entire field of view. I couldn't tell whether it was still growing or not. Then something appeared on the surface of the square, rippling into existence. It was the "Future of Gaming" logo! Then a message followed:
WELCOME TO ETHER
Cool, I thought to myself. It's working!
Then another message appeared:
REALITY CHECK: 1 HOUR
CHANGE?
This was the safety feature built into Ether, to remind you every so often that what you're doing is playing a computer game. I had heard there were difficulties in bringing game testers out of the virtual world if they weren't reminded. It must have felt too real for them or something. And it's probably dangerous to remove the headset from someone if they're still connected to Ether. Shock, for one thing. So they created this Reality Check, like an alarm clock, to wake you from your dreams.
I thought Yes, I want to change the Reality Check. And then a new message appeared:
NEW VALUE?
Three hours will do, I thought. I wanted to get a good play out of this thing before being reminded that it's only a game.
REALITY CHECK: 3 HOURS
OKAY?
Yes, I willed. The screen in front of me changed again.
REALITY CHECK CAN BE ALTERED AT ANY TIME.
JUST ASK!
And with that, the screen fled into the distance, vanishing into the darkness. I waited patiently for a moment, then another screen whirled towards me, until it filled my field of vision again. This one was blue with white letters. It said:
CHARACTER CREATION
NAME
GENDER
RACE
APPEARANCE
ADVANCED APPEARANCE
CLASS
PROFILE
SPECIALTIES
ITEMS
START IN: EPIC CITY
PLEASE SELECT WHAT YOU WANT TO ALTER
Then a wire-frame model appeared between myself and the screen, slowly rotating. It was meant to be a human male, but it just looked like a muscle-bound freak.
This must be the basic model, I thought. Have to change that, then. I thought about advanced appearance options, and all of a sudden I was presented with a screen full of measurements, each one paired to a scroll bar. Making a likeness of myself suddenly became a little more daunting.
Then it hit me. Why should I bother making an avatar that looks like me? Here I could be someone else entirely. Maybe I could give Karyn a real surprise!
I mean, this was just a game, right? What did I have to lose? With that in mind, I set about creating my first avatar.
