After Return

August 27, 2051

All over the world, the prime time news flashed, "FIRST SURVIVOR CONFIRMED AND AWAKE. MORE TO FOLLOW SOON" followed by the battle clip of the 900th Stage GM and Heathway along with the double kill achieved by a player. For the last five years, parents, friends and loved ones of the players trapped inside the game only saw the glimpses of the battles that were broadcasted by the authority controlling the BWS servers.

Most of them were the battles fought with SM's and GM's. This event raised the hopes of all people that other players might be able to regain consciousness and they might see someone they knew who fought or lived inside the deadly game.

Geneva, Switzerland

She opened her eyes feeling bit drowsy after the sudden flashes of lights subsided. The air smelled of disinfectant, but where was she? As her eyes adjusted slowly, she saw the ceiling first; it had lights. "Where am I? Arcadian didn't have these lights, no one crafted them." She spoke in a very low volume.

She looked here and there, and saw lots of beeping equipments, those were medical devices. "I am back, but…" then all the events preceding the flashes came back in her mind. "Commander Heathway…was the mastermind. He logged me out, Naperjet you're a cheater." She almost felt like yelling out but nothing except a soft whisper came out.

She pulled up her hand, trying to support herself but the state of it shocked her hard. It was extremely thin with bones, nerves and veins clearly visible, but before she could react the door on her right burst open and came in a doctor, two nurses and a man in a coat.

The doctor did all necessary checks with the monitors, with the nurses assisting him. Meanwhile, the other guy was sitting on the visitor's sofa and waited for the doctor to complete. As the doctor finished his checks and removed the Soul Box from her head, the man stood up and took a chair next to her.

Before he could begin, the doctor pointed a finger and asked, "What is your name?" to which she replied, "My name is Liza. Full name Liza Dutta." "Do you know where you are?" she nodded in negative and took some time to investigate her surroundings as she was helped in a sitting position.

She donned a hospital gown, had some strange wrist bands connected with wires and had a tube in the upper arm. She partially knew some of these things; the tube was an IV while the bands recorded her vitals and made sure that her muscles do not slack away.

As the doctor finished enquiry, the man began "Hello Liza! Welcome back." She smiled and tried to look out of the window on her left while the man continued, "My name is Aatmaram Mehta, and I am the special representative for BWS players in India. Congratulations on being the first one to come out of the game of death."

The man had a strange smile, "I see, you must be tired. Take some rest." And stood up walking across with the doctor and a nurse when she called out slowly, "Mr. Aatmaram!" he stopped and nodded, "What is happening in the last battle." He replied "Sorry, but we don't have the feed right now for the ongoing battle. Don't worry; transmission will start within ten minutes. Ask your nurse for anything you require."

The man left, keeping Liza waiting. The nurse sat beside Liza and the two eventually getting into a gossip, while Liza telling her about the adventures in the game and the nurse who called herself Ishita. Ishita told her that how within a few months a full-time care center for BWS players was created by UN and WHO, and all the players were transported from all over the globe to here. A few minutes later, Ishita remarked "Oh, I guess the feed has begun." She switched on the television set and it was the live feed of the last battle.

Liza watched everything with tears coming out, while the intensity of the battle even stunned Ishita. After it ended, Liza spoke up, "Ishita can you please confirm the current status of two people, their in-game names are Naperjet and Kimi." Ishita reached out to the comm.-phone of the room and asked about it. "Who are they?" Liza replied, "I married to Naperjet and we adopted Kimi. The guy who fought the last battle is him and the little girl came in mid is…"

Before she could complete, the comm.-phone reported the data to Ishita. She shook her head, "We lost Kimi about fifteen minutes ago, while Naperjet seems healthy but his vital signs are not much promising." Hearing that the people who were most close to her the whole time were not with her, Liza wished to go back into the game and live there happily with them.

Across the globe, phones rang with a government official telling people that their loved ones have woken up from their sleep. Many Head-of-States announced this info live in press conference. The government of Switzerland, under the directive of WHO; was issuing visas for the survivors' relatives. All flights to Switzerland were full, not because of any holiday season but due to the flock of relatives of the players.

The care center was 3KM out of Geneva, surrounded by mountains and was well guarded like an army camp. Rumors had that some nations hired professionals to pull down the building, in order to save the expenses that the governments of different countries were undertaking; though it was never proven.

Over the next few hours after awakening of Liza, almost all the comatose players came back except for one. The man who pulled up an intense battle and won against a seemingly impossible enemy, even by a small margin didn't come back. Though his brain was intact and his Soul Box active, there was no way of telling how long will it take before the last player comes out.

Naperjet, who lay in his room peacefully, was usually visited by his friends and Liza, who were wheeled by their nurses. Most were surprised by his physique in first go, he was extremely skinny and looked very weak physically. "There's no way he could wield those weapons here." Leonardo joked as he saw the real Naperjet for the first time.

Over the course of the next few days, all relatives of players came to the facility and met their loved ones. All were happy to see them after long five years, though they were asked not to mention the time specifically. The doctors however, were worried about the stress the players may feel when they realized that they spent five years inside the game instead of twenty.

After a two day stay, the parents were escorted back to their countries as the players would be discharged after all their physical and mental rehabilitation are finished. However, Naperjet's parents and sister stayed as the doctors needed to talk to them.

The head doctor of the facility called the trio in his cabin, the special representative Aatmaram was also present there. "I hope you understand the situation that he is the last player inside the game and somehow hasn't logged out. We suggest that we should try the basic emergency shutdown solutions." The trio's eyes widened as they grabbed the meaning, they were trying to cut-off the power to the Soul Box.

The doctor sensed the fear and continued, "We know your fear that forceful shutdown would cause damage to the brain, our best technicians have scanned the gizmo for last five years and we still haven't located the code that killed the players. Most probably it was the game, that contained the code and since others have come out safely we can assume that plugging off the device won't cause any harm."

The parents however, didn't seem convinced with the explanation but agreed to cut the power if Naperjet fails to wake up within a week. The family decided to stay in facility's guest room. While the parents often had long discussions with the officials, his sister Elena stayed in his room watching over his brother who was so close, yet so far away; waiting for his return.

A week had passed, over the course of which Elena befriended Liza and others who stayed in BWS with him. At last the doctors and the technicians decided to sever the power supply to his Soul Box. While Naperjet's family and friends were present there, none raised an objection. The internal battery was carefully disabled and then the main supply was shut down.

"If everything goes right, then we would see the result within five minutes. Either positive or…negative." The technician forced the words out of his mouth and everyone there waited impatiently for next five minutes. The doctor and nurses kept close eye on the vital signs.

Ten minutes passed there was no activity in his body, everything was silent just like before. The doctor went in for a final check when he noticed some disturbances in the EEG. The pulses became irregular and breathing activities increased. "This can be equally good or bad, what's up next doc." A technician responded, the doctor however knew what would come next.

He called for the nurse and asked for a stress relaxant. He injected the medicine and pronounced, "He's back. He would regain consciousness within a couple of hours." The room was filled with applause. Everyone was happy and the last survivor came back to the real world.

As Naperjet regained consciousness, an hour later he found Elena sitting next to him. "Hey Eli! Long time no see." Elena was first taken aback, but later burst into tears, "You are such a…such a… I thought I'd never see you again." The doctor arrived and conducted the checks and confirmations. "Excuse me Miss, but seems that we need have a brain scan of his. We need to ensure that there is no internal damage to his brain."

Elena was escorted out and Naperjet was taken to the outreach department for tests. The tests took full day and reports were good. The next morning, the special representative Aatmaram visited Naperjet in his room. Liza, Elena, Asri and others were already present there having a hearty talk about the life inside the game.

"It's him." Liza whispered pointing to the man. The representative however gave a smile, "Hi there! So, how's everything going?" And took a chair and sat down, "Tell me, I'm curious to know how it was inside?" However, no one spoke for the next few moments, everyone looking at the representative.

Naperjet spoke softly, "I hope you know quite well what was going on inside." The representative still smiling, "Yeah! But it's not fun; I want to know it directly from you. Moreover there are things that we don't know either. Like what happened in the week that followed the log out of most people except you Naperjet or should I call you Isaac Mehta."

Everyone looked at Naperjet, who said, "Yes, you can say that. I left Naperjet behind in the virtual world." He drew a long breath, "I was finishing a pending battle, and it seems that the battle went on too long." Aatmaram put a hand under his chin and fixed his gaze on the bony figure of Isaac. "The battle was going on in the 1000th Stage, if I am correct."

Isaac nodded and described the stage, "It was a graveyard of different weapons, all ready to be equipped. Best for a GM who can easily shatter any weapon. That was how the last stage is." Liza came up with another question, "What about Kimi? She died here, despite you used the Restoration Cube."

Now there were some tears in his eyes, "I know she died. I am sorry Liza…I was the one who killed Kimi." The whole room was engulfed in complete silence, everyone in shock. If it were the Liza in the game, she would've easily shot a dozen arrows in him. But now all she could do was glare at him. Aatmaram however said with a cool head, "Would you please elaborate the event."

Isaac sighed lightly and nodded, "I did manage to stop the termination program but until then it had completed 70% execution." Everyone was silent when Aatmaram broke the silence, "It means that her brain was already 70% destroyed. In that case even if she lived, she would be in a total vegetative state."

Isaac continued, "So, I increased the program's power to 2000%, self-destructing the Soul Box." Asri asked, "What did you achieve by doing that?" However, Isaac reached out for his Soul Box and separated the collar mike like parts and showed them, "Kimi is here inside these." All of the people present there were dumbfounded.

Liza spoke up, "I don't trust you. Not after what you have done?" She was referring to his decisions to surprisingly log her out, almost kill himself in the duel with Heathway. "Mr. Aatmaram, can you please bring any AR compatible device." Aatmaram brought out a projector like device, "This is the latest AR holographic projector. This would be the best for this situation."

He asked Aatmaram to connect the storage of his Soul Box to the projector and run it. As Aatmaram did so, the nurses accompanying Liza and Asri pulled up the curtains. The projector started and the room filled with faint blue light, Naperjet called out, "Hey Kimi! Are you there Kimi?" No voice came out for a while and Liza began shooting murderous glares at him.

A little later a distant yawn was heard and soon a voice came, "Good morning daddy." And a similar figure began taking shape. "Kimi!!!" Everyone cried and she let out a smile, "Hello Mommy, long time no sees. Hi everyone, what's up?" Everyone except Aatmaram and the nurses had tears of joy. The others however, were perplexed by the miracle; the consciousness of Kimi was preserved in electronic form.

"This is the same way Heathway or Aya Shua, escaped the police. He killed himself the first day by a similar high power termination." Isaac spoke up again, but Aatmaram knew half of it. "You're right, Aya Shua was found dead in his home a few hours after the live tutorial."

After a few talks with Kimi, Aatmaram left the room and soon Liza and his friends left for their rooms as well leaving Isaac and Elena alone. "We will be leaving tomorrow brother." She talked to her brother who promised to come soon, after completing the rehab.

The next day, Naperjet's parents were escorted to the airport from where they left for New Delhi. The same day, doctors decided to break the news that it has only been five years not twenty since the game began. The nurses assigned to each player had to tell this news but not in a straight forward sense.

As the nurses told the players, it led to huge outcry. Most players refused to believe the fact. Even after repeated counseling, many players couldn't comprehend the fact and went close to a mental breakdown.

(…To be continued…)