The Eye of Minds - James Dashner Page 0,3

breathe in the polluted air of the real world.

A blue light came on, revealing the door of the Coffin just a few inches from his face. The LiquiGels and AirPuffs had already receded, leaving the only part Michael truly hated, no matter how many times he did it—which was way more than he could count. Thin, icy strands of NerveWire pulled out of his neck and back and arms, slithering like snakes along his skin until they disappeared into their little hidey-holes, where they’d be disinfected and stored for his next game. His parents were amazed that he voluntarily let those things burrow into his body so often, and he couldn’t blame them. There was something downright creepy about it.

A loud click was followed by a mechanical clank and then a whooshing gust of air. The door of the Coffin began to rise, swinging up and away on its hinges like Dracula’s very own resting place. Michael almost laughed at the thought. Being a vicious bloodsucking vampire loved by the ladies was only one of a billion things a person could do inside the Sleep. Only one of a billion.

He stood up carefully—he always felt a little woozy after being Lifted, especially when he’d been gone for a few hours—naked and covered in sweat. Clothing ruined the sensory stimulation of the NerveBox.

Michael stepped over the lip of the box, thankful for the soft carpet under his toes—it made him feel grounded, back in reality. He grabbed the pair of boxers he’d left on the floor, put them on. He figured a decent person probably would’ve opted for some pants and a T-shirt as well, but he wasn’t feeling so decent at the moment. All he’d been asked to do by the Lifeblood game was talk a girl out of suicide for Experience Points, and not only had he failed, he’d helped drive her to do it for real. For real, for real.

Tanya—wherever her body might be—was dead. She’d ripped out her Core before dying, a feat of programming, protected by passwords, that she only could’ve done to herself. Faking a Core removal wasn’t possible in the VirtNet. It was too dangerous. Otherwise, you’d never know if someone was faking, and people would do it left and right for kicks or to get reactions. No, she’d changed her code, removed the safety barrier in her mind that separated the virtual and the real, and fried the actual implant back home, and she’d done it with purpose. Tanya, the pretty girl with the sad eyes and the delusions that she was being haunted. Dead.

Michael knew it’d be in the NewsBops soon. They’d report that he had been with her, and the VNS—VirtNet Security—would probably come and talk to him about it. They definitely would.

Dead. She was dead. As lifeless as the sagging mattress on his bed.

It all hit him then. Hit him like a fastball to the face.

Michael barely made it to the bathroom before throwing up everything in his stomach. And then he collapsed to the floor and pulled himself into a ball. No tears came—he wasn’t the crying sort—but he stayed there for a long time.

CHAPTER 2

THE PROPOSITION

1

Michael knew that most people, when they felt as if the earth itself decided it just didn’t like them anymore, when they felt like they were at the bottom of a dark pit, went to their mom or dad. Maybe a brother, maybe a sister. Those with none of the above might find themselves knocking at the door of an aunt, a grandpa, a third cousin twice removed.

But not Michael. He went to Bryson and Sarah, the two best friends a person could ever ask for. They knew him like no one else, and they didn’t care what he said or did or wore or ate. And he returned the favor whenever they needed him. But there was something very strange about their friendship.

Michael had never met them.

Not literally, anyway. Not yet. They were VirtNet friends through and through, though. He’d gotten to know them first in the beginning levels of Lifeblood, and they’d grown closer and closer the higher up they went. The three of them had joined forces almost from the day they met to move up in the Game of all Games. They were the Terrible Trio, the Trifecta to Dissect-ya, the Burn-and-Pillage-y Trilogy. Their nicknames didn’t make them many friends—they’d been branded cocky by some, idiots by others—but they had fun, so they didn’t care.

The bathroom floor was hard,