The venture into the digital universe
A few days had passed since the birthday party. I had not touched my laptop and decided to save it for the perfect day. It would only be one more week for the summer vacation to start. I boasted my laptop to friends and had a grand time in the two last weeks of school. Every day my mind was filled with new games that I could play. Shooting games, RPG games, Online Games, Car games… The possibilities were endless. "What is 101 x 99, Sam", asked my teacher during math class. I snapped out of my daydream. "Umm, it's…"
*Ring-Ring*.
"Saved by the bell", I thought, heaving a sigh of relief.
The final day had come. I rushed out of the bus, quickly opened the front door, greeted my mom, and ran into my room. There it was, my brand new gaming laptop sitting on the desk. It looked just like the ones I had seen on the web. It had all the features but it looked way different. It was also slow which was quite unusual for such a gaming laptop. I deleted a few files like some system files and dump files. Then, I opened up the search browser and typed in "Video Games for computers". I scrolled and scrolled until I finally found one. I had never seen it before. Looks like it was a special game only available to this laptop. "Digital Odyssey". A nice name. I read the description. "A game to literally immerse you into the world of a computer". What a weird description. I clicked the download button and waited patiently. My mom came in to check on me. "Looks like you're really excited. Well, since you got a lot of good grades you can play for 2 hours. I need to get some rest. *Yawn* Also, don't stare into it for too long", she said. I agreed and turned around to my laptop. The download had finished. I clicked open just as my mom shut the door close. I sat there, tingling with excitement.
Everything changed in a matter of seconds. One second I was in my room, comfortably seated on my chair, the next I was falling through a blue-colored abyss right into a glossy blue floor. I thought I was going to get really hurt, really fast when my eyes caught sight of a cylindrical trashcan right next to where I was going to fall. I smashed into it. My head was spinning around, I was really dizzy. As I regained full consciousness, I observed my surroundings. The trashcan barely protected me from my fall. There were a few pieces of paper and some folders around me. Curiously, I picked up one of them and read out the label, 'System Dump files (Deleted Friday 2:12 PM)'. It started to dawn on me… This was the same file I deleted just before downloading the game. So that would mean… "I'M STUCK IN MY LAPTOP", I screamed in terror. I quickly stood up and looked at where the screen was supposed to be. All I saw was an endless plot of the same terrain. I looked around. All the same, files that I had on my desktop could now be seen. The glossy floor I was standing on was the Taskbar. "Maybe I can escape through one of the settings in the taskbar", I thought. I clicked on many apps. I opened my search browser. I could search for it just using my mind, it was fascinating but terrifying at the same time. It seemed like hours had passed as I furiously opened all the apps I could. Nothing worked. I sat there in despair and vowed to never use the laptop if I got out and to never trust Uncle Jeff's presents blindly ever again. As I sat there looking down, I saw the faint shadow of something come into my sight.