ALTERNATIVE LIFE EXPERIENCE - part 1

Chapter 1.1

Wednesday June 25, 2025

My whole life was turned upside down by three little words:

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Before that, everything was going just fine – well, almost. I was a nineteen-year-old student, a fan of video games, I had a brilliant BFF, a sexy boyfriend and I lived with an awesome blended family.

However, I had also been given an inquisitive mind as well as a trusting nature, so when my virtual buddy Eo sent me a web address, I simply entered it without asking any questions. In this area, I tended to follow him blindly. Turns out it was perhaps not the best of ideas!

Eo was a beta-tester for an e-mag called Play the Range. He tested and commented on games and new computer equipment before they were launched on the market. He spent most of his time connected to the network and had a particular liking for World Game – WG for the aficionados – the largest multi-game platform in the world. These last twelve months, I had taken an active part in the large-scale war of WOP (World of Power) in the guild which he led. We had spent hours and hours together, combating digital bad guys through our avatars.

In real life, he lived in Berlin and I lived in Brussels. Besides that, I knew neither his physical appearance, nor even his age. There was a golden rule among gamers: no private life in virtuality. On the other hand, I knew the essentials: Eo's sole passion in life was to knock out the enemy.

Last winter, he'd vaguely spoken to me about a project being developed, without giving any detail, just that this test was ultra-confidential and would be of a 'new kind' and 'perhaps remunerated,' two factors which had piqued my interest. In addition to having a curious nature, I was not against the idea of earning some cash. However, Eo had not gone any deeper into the subject. He had forwarded me a very detailed questionnaire that had taken me more than a week to fill in and he had then refused to comment on it. After that, he simply gave me a date, an address and an hour of appointment in WG, insisting on the fact that he was counting on me to be there.

I wasn't really a pro, I just liked to play after dinner. I found that television programs remained mediocre despite the hundreds of channels available. The Web, on the other hand, offered an alternate and more attractive life in so many domains, without having to leave your home or fear for your security.

Well... that's what I believed... in the very beginning.

Like many young people, I had chosen that year to do VPU, Virtual Professional University. I followed half the courses at the rue de la Loi, and the other half attending remote cyber classes from my bedroom. I'd had a hard time convincing my mother; she took a negative view of this still-experimental method of teaching, which, from my point of view, was totally awesome. She feared 'various and ignored' repercussions for my health due to prolonged time in bed with my mind somewhere else in cyberspace (lol). After hours of discussion, and faced with my relentlessness, she had finally given in, 'with conditions.' In exchange for her agreement, I accepted to go to the gym twice a week, a 'concrete' one, she had said! And, above that, I had to promise to drastically reduce my time on the Web during the school holidays, to go out and breathe some fresh air, the fresh but polluted Brussels air. So I let her dream on. She'd never know.

In fact, my mother was so concerned for my physical health that she invested in a memory foam mattress and pillow which were supposed to help my body suffer less from long hours exposed to a horizontal position. My classroom had never been so comfortable.

My stepfather Luc, a computer engineer who was mindful of my success, had given me a fantastic back-to-school gift: the WA21, the latest in virtual reality headsets. In addition to being light, ergonomic, with HD vision and three-dimensional sound, it also integrated the very latest improvements of mind-controlled commands. The Rolls-Royce of headsets. Near-total immersion guaranteed. The best of the best.

23:58. In two minutes, I was going to begin the most extraordinary - as in fantastic, mind-blowing, insane - virtual experiment of my life. Most painful also, in the literal sense of the word. However, at that time, I didn't know anything about it.

I lay down, pulled up my sheet in case I got cold in the middle of the night, and put on my headset. I'd been waiting for three weeks. The big day had finally arrived. I was pretty keyed up. Instructions popped up in front of my eyes.

Please wait while WA21 is being installed.

Hello, WaveRider. Please enter your destination.

WaveRider, that's me. It's like, my war-name. I came up with this name during our last holiday with my father. I was eleven years old. We'd gone to the south-west coast of France at the beginning of July. There were a handful of tourists under the gray sky that day, but the rough ocean had attracted at least ten surfers. On standby, straddling their boards like d'Artagnan his warhorse, they lay waiting for The Wave, the one that would make them vibrate and would enable them to defy the elements for a few seconds.

My father liked to look at the ocean. And I loved my father.

That morning, his mind was with the surfers. "You see, Lola, in life you need to act like them. You need to have good equipment, observe your environment, study the ebb and the flow, row hard, then when it's THE moment, get in position and surf the wave."

Surf the wave... That was an excellent image of what I wanted. That was how my virtual self was born a few weeks later. WaveRider.

On the design front, I hadn't overflowed with creativity. A digital photograph of myself and a 3D design software had been enough to last me a few years. As I grew, my avatar grew as well. Of average build, with hazel eyes and dark brown hair tied up in a pony tail, WaveRider usually wore black baggy gym pants and a pale pink T-shirt with a V-collar three hundred sixty-five days per year. On a superb tanned skin. Hey, I was stunning!

The clock finally showed midnight. I entered the destination that Eo had sent: ALE2100S2T.