"Ah!" I yelled. I opened my eyes but I couldn't see anything. "It's dark. Is it night? Was I dreaming? I don't remember going to sleep." I thought to myself. I looked around; I couldn't see anything. Every thing was black. Not only could I not see anything, I could barely move: my arms, my legs, my head, it's as if they were stuck in very thick honey.

"Where am I?" I thought to myself. I was not going to get an answer to that question. I'd never seen a place like this before. I seemed to be alone. I tried to peer into the darkness. No matter where I looked I couldn't see anything. No shadows, no reflections, no light, a black canvas just out of reach and if it was solid, it would have been too far away for me to discern any part of it.

I seemed to be on my back, or at least horizontal. I didn't recall falling down though. Falling down implies that you've fallen onto something. As such, I didn't appear to be on anything at all. It gave me the impression that I was floating. It was the same feeling you get when you float on your back in a pool except in this case I couldn't feel any water around me.

I strained to look at my body, my hands, and my feet. Oddly enough I could see my body. It wasn't in darkness, it actually seemed to give off light. I was dressed as I usually was, wearing my current armour configuration. Everything on me seemed to be in its regular place. "Nothing's missing. At least that's something." I said to myself. I watched as I tried to move my arm and my hands, as if staring at them would make them move. It had no effect

It did give me a slight headache so I tried to relax. As I did, I thought I heard a noise. I strained to hear it, but it vanished when I did. So I tried to relax again. This time it came back. Muffled sounds as if very far away or through a wall or layers of clothing. The sounds were rapid, in short bursts. They would come and then die away completely. Then nothing, my mind went completely blank.

I woke up again with a start. "Did I fall asleep? What's this strange feeling?" I wondered. I felt compressed for a moment then let go. A bit like being on a crowded bus when people get on or off, they push and move people out of the way, and you get squished against a pole or another person. And then it settles as the bus leaves and people relax.

I stared out into the blackness, that still surrounded me, trying to focus on what would happen next. Then a new sensation came. Very light vibrations, barely perceptible, along my back and my legs. They stopped for a brief time, maybe thirty seconds, maybe a minute, before resuming again, this time punctuated by light jerks. I was overtaken by a dizziness just as the vibrations stopped. If I'd been standing I would have fallen down.

I instinctively closed my eyes to block out the dizziness, which turned out to be a little pointless. What I saw with my eyes closed was the same as with my eyes open: total blackness. Eventually the feeling went away and I was felt totally alone again, floating in this empty space. I decided it was better to try to relax, and to try to think about other things, than to worry about something I couldn't change.

My thoughts strayed to the moment before everything went black: the moors, the goblins, Karla. "Karla! Oh my goodness Karla. I hope she's alright. Is she stuck like me? Or is she all alone on the moors if I'm here, wherever here happens to be? And, if so, did she get back to town safely. Stupid system, I can't even open my menu to send her a message." I worried.

"The health bar. Her health bar should be under mine, we were in a party." I babbled. I strained and tried to move my head enough to see our health bars. Both our health bars were there, almost full. I calmed down a bit. But something was wrong. "The bars are gray! Both of them. How can they be gray?" I puzzled. I'd never seen that before anywhere in the game.

"So I'm no further ahead. I don't know if Karla is still alive." I thought. I felt myself welling with anguish. Not that I could shed any tears or whatnot, I couldn't outwardly express any emotion. I could only feel it in my thoughts. I tried to calm myself. "Turn it around Wolf. Not knowing if she's alive means you also don't know that she's dead. You just don't know!" I scolded.

"I will assume, until proven otherwise, that she is alive. I can't bear to think about it any other way." I concluded. I forced myself to recall her face, happy or sad it was all the same to me as long as I could recall it. I saw her, like flashbacks in a movie. Different places and different moments where I had looked at her and had captured an image in my mind. And for a moment I forgot where I was. Lost in my thoughts I must have fallen asleep.

I couldn't tell how long I'd been out when I was stirred from my slumber by more vibrations along my whole body. Again they were weak and only perceptible along my back and legs. But they were punctuated by occasional jerks in movement which startled me. It's one of these jerks that had woken me. The silence I'd experienced before was now filled with muffled voices and sounds.

A strange mixture of high pitched sounds, very low rumbles, and incomprehensible voice like sounds. Combining that with the vibrations, made for an unsettling mix. If I focused on something they'd go away, if I relaxed and emptied my mind they would come back in force. Though I couldn't understand anything I heard, it gave off a feeling of urgency and stress.

It frustrated me that I couldn't figure out the reason for being where I was, and how I'd gotten here. "Why wasn't I in the game? What had happened to me? Or am I still in the game under the influence of some paralyzing effect?" I chased the thought away. "That couldn't be, paralysis in games just prevents you from acting, it doesn't make you black out." A horrifying thought crossed my mind. "Have I been disconnected from the game?" I worried.

"Why me? I don't want to die here!" I tried to scream. We'd had all seen the reports of people dying when they were forced out of the game. "I'm going to die because of a bug in the program. And there's nothing I can do about it." I admitted. "Help me. Help me! Anyone!" I attempted to cried out. It was hopeless, what little sound I could muster was barely audible.

I was shaking on the inside, even if my body remained still, and I felt sick. I would have thrown up under normal circumstances, but the system didn't seem to permit it. I was panicking, imagining all types of horrible effects I would feel the moment I would die. It would either be that I'd be wracked with terrible pain or at the other extreme, I would simply fade away not knowing that the end had come. Neither prospect appealed to me.

I felt I'd lost. It's ironic to think that I could lose by being lost. I didn't know where I was, facing my end, unable to fight, unable to abandon either. If this had been a duel I could have at least had the option to resign. "I can't even abandon." I snorted. I resigned myself to the fact that I had to simply wait for the end.

"I can't abandon." I thought. There was no way to cancel my current state. But somehow the words stirred something in my brain. "I can't abandon!" the words meaning seemed to change. "I shouldn't abandon even if I was able to." the words no longer sounded depressing. "There's too much out there for me. There's no way I'll let anything make me lose hope." I exclaimed to myself.

"I will not abandon!"