Total Drama Endless, Epilogue part 0
Author's Note.
This is it. No going back now. Time to leave Wonderland. One final time I hope you're prepared for what's in store.
August 30th 2007
Chris Mclean stretched out over the red armchair contently and savoured what a joy it was to be him.
He was on a talk show tour of Toronto. Basic PR work. His natural element. By now the whole act had almost become muscle memory. People said he had a sixth sense for this sort thing, enough so that he'd probably manage these evening fluff pieces fine even if he hadn't been doing them since the mid 1980's when he was six years old and the old late night legend Conner O'Gleeson was still on air.
Starting that young had been the work of his old manager. A greasy haired, towering figure, smelling hideously of tobacco. The man had plucked him out of a public addition in St John's and set him on the path to stardom. Somewhere, stowed deep beneath the darkest recesses of mind there was part of Chris that sorely resented the man. The way he had stolen his childhood and leered over his mother. But he had to hand it to the guy, he had known talent when he saw it. Besides, if he hadn't found him he wouldn't have had much of a future back in Newfoundland. The Mclean clan had all been cod fishermen for generations. After the Cod Moratorium in 92', most of them had lost their livelihoods.
The hostess opposite him pursed her red lips as they waited for the clips playing behind them on large screen to finish. He had been in a lot of odd projects over the last few years. But he was proud of this one. When he had pitched it to his agent she had nearly dropped him as a client. Said it was beneath him and that none of the Big Three would ever take interest.
She had been right about that, NBC, ABC, CBS, all snubbed their noses to him. In the end he had to settle for a Canadian network. They wouldn't say no to him. They couldn't afford to. CanCon, a content law enforced by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission required at least 50% of content on Canadian airwaves to be made in the country. It was supposed to help preserve cultural integrity or some crap. In actuality all it did was fill every local TV channel with unwatchable garbage while any Canadian entertainer worth a damn did the smart thing and moved down to the States.
He had settled his show into a prime timeslot on one of the two children's channels, Teletoon. He figured his show was going to be good enough that it'd draw a crowd no matter where it was airing.
As usually he had been right.
"So. Chris, we're all dying to know…" Began the hostess, a main stay of the Toronto celebrity gossip world by the name of Blaineley O'Halloran. "How's it feel being the biggest name in TV right now?"
Chris laughed airily.
"Amazing. Like seriously awesome. I'm at the top of the world and the view is like totally sweet."
Blaineley chuckled politely. "I'll say. It must be nice to be you right now."
"You have no idea." He flashed her a superior smirk. "Seriously."
"To whom do you credit Total Drama's unparalleled success?" Blaineley probed.
"Easy. Me." Chris boasted. "TDI is my baby. I know its not standard fair for the host to call the shots on a reality show. But I don't care. It's my show, and I've got the best ideas!"
The crowd applauded, most likely because someone had just flip on a sign telling them to. He didn't care. He loved their attention, sincere or not.
"What about these challenges you made your contestants suffer through?" Blaineley asked. "Some people are thinking they're a little too cruel for teens. Spoilers for those still living under a rock, by I hear there were even some bear attacks out in the island. One even got pretty grizzly. Any regrets at all?"
"Uh, don't know. Let me think about it. Oh yeah, uh NEVER! Don't know if you've noticed Blaineley but Total Drama is the hottest thing out right now because it's so brutal! That's what got the genre off the ground in the first place. All that stuff's real dude! It's gross! It's sick! It's totally outrageous! And most of all… It get's people glued to their screens! Besides… these kids want to famous? Then they've got to earn it!"
The audience cheered again. Punctuating his remarks. Blaineley laughed her polite chortle again. All these shows were like this. The same formula over and over again.
"I certainly could take my eyes off it." She admitted. "So tell me, If it's only up, up and away from here, what's next in store for Total Drama? Are you confident you've got staying power? Or is Total Drama just another fad?"
"Are you kidding me dude!? My show a fad? Not a chance! So long as they're people willing to humiliate themselves and people at home willing to watch it, then Total Drama's gonna be around forever! This is peak prime time TV! What's gonna overtake us?"
…
They broke for commercial and Chris excused himself to the catering table. The production staff all falling over themselves as he passed them. He paid them no mind. They were beneath him.
When he reached the buffet he gave something of a reproachful look, disappointed by the spread. Part of him considered snubbing his nose at the whole thing, but he was hungry, so he began filling up a plate regardless.
"That was really something up there."
Chris looked up from his plate almost in spite of himself. A figure was lingering awkwardly in the corner by the table. A man his about his age with curly dark hair, horn rimmed glasses and an ill-fitting windbreaker. Chris made a point to ignore him. The man didn't seem to take the hint.
"Chris Mclean right? I…I um remember you from Fametown."
That caught Chris's attention. It admittedly wasn't often these days that someone brought up his old boy band.
"Good for you." He said pointily. "Hey since you've got nothing better to do. Mind refiling this bean dip?"
The man laughed slightly. "Oh I don't work here no… I'm the next guest on after you."
"Are you?"
"Yeah… we've this new project over at Gregarious Games…"
Tech guy. That explained it, Chris thought. No wonder this weirdo looked so unwashed. He probably hadn't been outside for months.
"Normally we send Og out on these sorts of PR stuff. He's a good hype man yeah… But this new project… you know it's… well it's kind of my baby. So I came up from Columbus personally. Og said it was a good excuse to get out of the office, visit another country, visit Toronto. He knows after all I'm a big fan of your guy's music."
He pulled at the worn black Rush 2112 T-Shirt he was wearing. Chris merely rolled his eyes.
"Yeah… here's a suggestion Sheldon Cooper. Go make your life story someone else's problem okay?"
The man grimaced slightly.
"Sheldon Cooper. Very funny. He's the guy from that new show right? Yeah I've been hearing that one a lot lately."
He smiled awkwardly down at his shoes. Then far too abruptly for Chris's liking let out a manic hyena like laugh. He then pushed his glasses back into place with an index finger and continued on like nothing had happened.
"I don't watch TV now a days. None of that whatever they've got on now, that reality TV stuff? All that crap. It doesn't interest me."
"You got a problem with Reality TV dude?" Chris asked him, liking the stranger less and less by the second. Normally he would have walked away by now, but apparently a month of putting up with social skill suicide victims like Beth, Ezekiel and Harold had increased his tolerance for nerd ramblings.
The dev gave him another awkward grin.
"The problem's in the name. Reality TV. Who wants reality in their entertainment? TV, Movies, Tabletop, it's all… you know it's supposed to be escapism. Being human totally sucks most of the time. Video games are the only thing that make life bearable. My new project… I'm not give any spoilers yet but it's gonna really help people with that."
Chris was about to tell the dev exactly where he could stick his new project, when an actual employee ran in.
"Five minutes. Mr Mclean."
"Sounds like you're up again." The dev noted unhelpfully.
"Sounds like it." Chris said dryly. "Well dude, much as I'd love to keep listen to you talk about nothing I've got to talk to some real people now. Let me know how your little project goes."
The man replies but Chris didn't hear him, he was already trying to scrub him from his memory.
Only years later would he remember his early meeting with James Donovan Halliday.
…
The world turned slowly but determinedly on its axis. Human civilization glimmered in the dark expanse of the cosmos. Its culture and politics going through the movements of their ever-changing dance.
On Wall Street the stock exchange plummeted. The Housing market crashed, and the shock waves sent ripples throughout the entire western world.
In Hollywood the celebrities looked on with the smiling indifference, alien to the plight of everyday living. In the theatres a new wave of summer blockbusters came and went. A Batman film updated for the times, a long awaited fourth Indiana Jones that got a mixed reception, and a new film set in Narnia. The second entry in the Walt Disney company's attempt to replicate the success of the Lord of the Rings.
Abroad, Beijing hosted the summer Olympics, and China seemed ready to open up to the world. The governing Chinese Communist Party prioritizing growth and capital over ideology. Mainlander, Hong-Kongers, and even Taiwanese celebrities sung songs in mandarin exulting the beauty of their home culture. All of them prouder and richer than the had ever been.
Teenage girls became obsessed with vampires, singing high schoolers, and tweens hosting their own web shows.
The Large Hadron Collider opened.
Kosovo declared independence.
Social media asserted itself.
The Phoenix probe found water on Mars.
A black man was elected president of the free world.
The decade had begun in fire, in smoke, fear and the thunderous noise of falling skyscrapers. Confusion begot fear. Fear begot angry. By now the worst of that had passed. The economy may have been suffering, and the culture of the time was largely shallow but it didn't matter.
People had hope.
By the time a year had gone by he was by on the talk show tour promoting the second season, Total Drama Action. Though he would never admit it this one might not have been as good as they first one. Some of the die hards on the online message boards agreed, but no one else seemed to have cared that much. Total Drama's star power still shown brightly.
Action carried him through 2009. Then came a new decade and with it, their third season. Total Drama World Tour, and Total Drama mania went into full swing.
The world went mad for World Tour and the franchise as a whole. It was a pop cultural juggernaut. Part of the many great franchises the world lost it's mind over like Harry Potter, Batman and Star Wars. Total Drama surpassing its rival Survivor as the most popular reality show out there, Chris himself becoming of the face of the very medium, as Mickey Mouse was to animation or Mario was to gaming.
He could feel the genuine reverence emitting from Blaineley as he graced her lowly talk show with his presence. The hostesses herself had played a guest role in the last season, but at that point even she couldn't help but be starstruck by him.
"So Chris? Any news on season four."
Chris smirked down at her.
"You of all people should know I don't spoil season secrets Mildred."
The crowd laughed uproariously and unpromptely. Blaineley smiled awkwardly, taking the dig in good nature.
"That's true. But you've got to have something to share for an old contestant."
Chris smirk coyly. "I might have something…"
The audience drew in breath. He lived for moments like this. For the big reveals he got to inflict on people.
"Thing is about our cast. They're great victims and trust me, I've got it in their contracts that they could keep going for years. But their reactions are getting a little predictable. Next season I don't know. Maybe we'll bring in some new blood."
He grinned fiendishly as the information began to make it's through the audience. Chris cocked a single eyebrow to send the point home.
"Any volunteers?"
The crowd screamed in excitement. Chris basked in their attention.
It was the most famous he'd ever be.
…
The problems started small. Little cracked in his media empire's borders. One's that could be covered up and ignored.
Season four of Total Drama, Revenge of the Island ended up being a rush job and with a reduced cast. His planned theme of a Wawanakwa overrun with nuclear fallout had suddenly become distasteful in 2011 when halfway through production when in earthquake in Japan triggered a meltdown at Fukushima. They salvaged as much of the theming as they could but the reworks put production behind. It meant less time for writing, and people noticed.
Personally, as far as the work Chris himself did behind the scenes, that was all still perfect. Like everything else he did. However, there were complications. New show writers and producers were brought in that didn't quite understand his vision. He had largely intimidated them into falling into line by the end of the season but they had done some damage. And some of the old fans were noticing. Fortunately like Action, the common conscientious was still great.
The next year they pulled out all the stops. Total Drama season five, All-Stars. The most extreme, most fan-servicing cast yet. This was supposing to be the series moment of glory.
It bombed horribly.
It shook people's faith in the franchise, including the network execs.
So they got desperate.
They forced him to try something even more attention grabbing and for Season six, Pahkitew Island, they put out another casting call.
It got people's attention all right.
…
It was late 2012 now. Chris was back on Blaineley's show.
Everything had changed from the last few times he had been here. For one thing, he could've had sworn the seats had gotten more uncomfortable since the last few times. The atmosphere too was completely different. All the reverence had disappeared from Blaineley's eyes. The ocean of power between them had shrunk to a stream, and it was her turn to gloat now.
"Well Chris..." She said her voice overtly sweet and under laced with poison. "I under the press has been hard on you. So I'll do you a favour and be the first congratulate you. That whole Pahkitew Island finale? Great stuff! Couldn't take my eyes off it. Easily some of the best acted television out this fall."
"Gee Thanks." Chris says through gritted teeth. Somehow he had agreed to this interview believing she wouldn't drag this out.
Blaineley tapped her chin playfully.
"Only thing is… I thought you we're opening up the cast again Chris? Said you were gonna give us real folk another chance of stardom. Isn't what you promised? Real people off the streets?"
He scowled. Blaineley turned to her audience.
"Imagine my shock then when I see the new cast. A fairy tale princess wannabe? A super villain wannabe? An actual super villain? Isn't it strange? I don't ever to seem meet people like that on the streets."
"We don't show you everything in the episodes. Only the juiciest most drama inducing stuff makes final cut. That's why it's called Total Drama." Chris insists. Blaineley laughed viciously.
"Oh is that what we're calling it now?" She sneers. "Let's be honest for once Chris. You promised teens all across the country they could be part of the hottest show on TV, then hired a bunch of character actors in their place without telling anyone."
"They weren't all fake, most of them were just playing their real selfs!" He insisted. She didn't listen. Blaineley was circling in for the kill.
"Pahkitew Island was scripted! It was all faked!"
"Every reality show has fake stuff bro! It's show biz! It's the way it is for a reason."
"But a whole season scripted on the most popular reality show out there?" She shook her head disapprovingly. Chris rose from his seat.
"Look Mildred! You think you're proud of yourself for uncovering this little conspiracy? Well I got real news for you! Every season of this show's been faked in some way! Of course, we've been freaking faking things dude! You think I'd actually do half the things we do on our show to real teens!? You think we made them jump off a thousand foot cliff for real!? That we really almost let them drown in a fake sub? That we got permission to climb over the Statue of Liberty!?"
He laughed joylessly.
"OF COURE NOT! We never did any of that for real. Because it would have been illegal! And it would have gotten people killed. So we did what everyone is this industry does on the regular, we faked things. We exaggerated how dangerous things were, we put a couple guys in suits and made them pretend to be wildlife. We even filmed all of World Tour on the Action film set. That's right campers, Total Drama has never left the Province of Ontario! It's always been this way. Sorry if admitting that 'destroys the magic'. If you want to get mad at some one for it blame the media, and their stupid thirst for controversy."
"Get real Chris. So what if other productions are fake? They didn't offer people a fair competition and a chance to win a million big ones."
"Total Drama is fair! That part's always been truth. You know that! Even if the challenges are bogus, the feelings those teens on my show are real. As are the depths they sink to step over each other. We're a legit reality show, whether you like it or not!"
"Not much of a point of if everyone's just playing a part!"
Chris rose forcefully from his seat, kicking the glass coffee table in front of him out of the way. It shattered, causing Blaineley to momentarily break her smug demeanor and scramble backwards on her seat in fear. Chris gave her and her stunned audience on last reproachful look. Then stormed off the set.
In the coming weeks the moment of defiance would haunt him. Any decent points he or anyone else had defending the Pahkitew controversy were by in large ignored. On the growing web he and his production were quickly subjected to thousand internet memes. His former star power reduced to an object of scorn and mockery. Brand deals and studio offers dried up. Chris was reduced to the same thing he had been from 1997 to 2006. A has been. Doomed to spend most the decade in the shadows. His name now only ever uttered with the same disdainful tone as Charlie Sheen, Mel Gibson, Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, Britney Speers and all the other stars of the 2000s society had declared mentally unfit to be famous in the 2010s.
Then a few years later (About the time Courtney got her Doctorate in Law from McGill University) the lawsuits from former contestants began pouring in and for several mouths Total Drama was in the news again for all the wrong reasons.
Fortunately, though, Chris's role as an internet meme was short lived. The world wide web was of course a fickle thing, and it within a few short months another man had completely and utterly stolen everyone else's thunder.
James Halliday.
On December 21st 2012 Gregarious Games suddenly rebranded to Gregarious Simulations Systems. The same day they released their flagship product, one they had been developing in secret for the past ten years. The Ontologically Anthropocentric Sensory Immersive Simulation, or the more plainly The OASIS. The world's first Virtual Reality Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game.
Halliday and his business partner Ogden Morrow immediately created a media sensation around their work. Both the OASIS softwear and hardwear with it's sleek visor and formfitting haptic gloves were wildly ahead of the time. A point driven home when a few years later their competitors such the Oculus Rift and VRchat released without being able to do a quarter of what the OASIS could. Og and Halliday had revolutionized Virtual Reality overnight. Doing for it what Tim Berners-Lee had done for the Internet or what Steve Jobs had done for the cell phone.
The only problem was the price. The game itself only cost 25 cents to register an account, but the hardware was a thousand dollars. Far too expense for the average person to spend on (what was for the time) only seen as a flashy video game.
So after the media frenzy had died down, after Halliday was praised to high heavens and made the cover of Time and just about every magazine out there, the hype began to fade, and the OASIS settled into it's niche. Userbase by the end of the decade was about four million. Far surpassing it's VR competitors but still only average numbers for an MMO. And a drop in the ocean compared to the 4.39 Billion Global internet users at the time.
…
The world turned slowly but determinedly on its axis. Human civilization glimmered in the dark expanse of the cosmos. Its culture and politics going through the movements of their ever-changing dance.
The Western economies recovered and rebounded.
Teens moved on from vampires and became obsessed with dystopias like Divergent.
The internet truly went mainstream, it's creators quickly rising to the same heights as more conventional celebrities.
Streaming services rose and cable fell.
Disney bought half of Hollywood and became more powerful than it had been since the 1990s.
Rainforests were felled
Seas warmed.
Russia invaded Crimea.
Young Arabs rose against their dictators.
America pulled out of Iraq
Jihadists filled in the power vacuum.
Ancient cities were destroyed with bulldozers and sledgehammers.
Ancient minorities were mascaraed.
Bombs when off in the heart of Europe.
Hope turned to fear.
People put their faith in evil men.
The world turned cruel.
…
Late 2019 now. The set had changed slightly over the years. There was a wooden coffee table now to begin with. Blaineley's fashion had shifted slightly as well. Her hair was curled, her large hoop earrings gone and her make up more natural.
Siting across from her was a much-changed Chris Mclean. He smiled over at her calmly, clad in a pastel blue button-down shirt, khaki pants and a cream coloured cardigan wrapped around his neck.
"I've really grown from Pahkitewgate." He said with the serenity of yogi. "I've dug deep inwards. I've look at my actions through the eyes of those I've hurt. I've reached out to those people and…" He paused for a moment trying to remember how his agent had phrased it. "I've really… embraced reconciliation you know? Really made it a part of who I am."
"You think you're ready for the world again?" Blaineley asks.
"I'm definitely ready for a second chance."
"Isn't this technically your third chance?"
Chris laughed awkwardly
"Uh yeah… Technically."
Somewhere in the studio he felt his PR manager was probably cursing him.
"Why is it you feel a show like Total Drama needs a revival?" Blaineley probed. Chris gave her a silent note of thanks for changing the topic.
"Because even if we seriously messed some things up by the end, Total Drama brought a lot of joy to a lot of people and I want to recapture that.
"The worlds changed since TD's last been air."
"I know a lot of things have changed. Nice coffee table by the way."
The audience chuckled knowingly. Chris beamed at them. God he'd been lonely these past years.
"We've put a serious amount of time and effort into bringing you the best possible version of Total Drama. We've listened to the fans and the lawsuits! From now on we're keeping things on fan favorite locale Camp Wawanakwa and filling our cabins with one hundred percent guaranteed real fans. The actors will not be coming back. Ever!"
The audience cheers.
"2020 will be our year dudes!" He boasts.
…
The next year found him siting six feet away from Blaineley in an empty studio.
"By 2020 I definitely meant 2021." Chris clarified, speaking through a surgical mask.
…
By late 2022 Total Drama began airing its first new episodes in ten years. They were different from the first batch, more honest, more conventional. But these changes were received warmly by fans and critics. Two seasons were completely by years end, then two more the next year and the year after that.
The show maintained a stable biannual schedule in fact for the next quarter century. Never reaching the heights of the late 2000s but it was stable success. Chris's star power held firm and old contestants began to speak fondly of their time of the show, even returning of their own desire on occasion.
From 2022 in through the 2040s they did everything right…
but it wasn't enough. And it wasn't even their fault. Put plainly the world around them was falling apart.
…
There had been so much hope for the 21st century. After the bloodshed of the 20th had seemingly ended in peace people had truly thought the world could break its cycles of violence. There had been so much hope for peace, for progress, for science and tolerance.
All of it wasted.
By the 2020s climate change had transformed from hypothetical to reality. Extreme weather and raising temperatures were actively threatening global food supplies, finite fossil fuel deposits were dwindling. Global pandemics, long thought a thing of the past came pouring across the new millennial. Six of them breaking out between 2020 and 2040, each killing tens of millions. This was a time more so than any since the nuclear escalations of the Cold War that the global order needed to step up. That needed humanity to face these challenges united.
But it was too much to ask of them.
Instead, in the first signs of hardship, vast swaths of the world put their blind faith in populists.
In their hands mankind put all their fears, to which their strong men assured them that they were all unfounded. That there were no plagues or oil shortages or changing climate. All of these were hoaxes made by foreign agents to subvert the weak minded. The real struggle was one of face.
Everywhere from Brasilia to Budapest to Beijing the so call truth they told was the same. That the majority ethnic group had some how become oppressed by the minorities, the predominate ideology or faith needed protecting, the patriarchy must be upheld, hostile foreign powers must be stood up to, and the superior intellect and moral character of the president must never be questioned.
One after another nations destroyed their democratic institutions and foreign reputations. Proclaiming proudly on haigh that their shackles had been cut and that were destine to return to the greatness they once held in the indeterminate past.
And everywhere people suffered.
Wars begun in nationalist pride; Riots begun in righteous fury added more bodies to the growing piles. All the while the real crises worsen while so many lived in ignorance of their severity. People refused to vaccinate in pandemics, take shelter in hurricanes and heat waves. Dying for the ignorance of others.
Disinformation stole entire countries in their false realities. The Russians and the Chinese once so happy to be free of their chains applauded wildly as their masters built new cages for them.
Countries began to collapse, balkanizing into several weaker states or falling outright into anarchy. First Sri Lanka.
Then Myanmar.
South Africa.
The Democratic Republic of the Congo
Ethiopia.
Egypt.
North Korea.
Indonesia.
Turkey.
The United Kingdom.
Each one plunging tens of millions of souls into chaos. Every day, every minute, the news media was choked by human agony on a scale to hard to comprehend.
So people stopped trying.
People stopped caring.
Tech innovations had by now made Halliday's OASIS accessible to all, and people flocked to it's ranks. As reality crumble outside vast swaths of the population now spent most waking hours building a fictional one far grander. Entire pre-established fiction universes were rendered in life sized scale and loving detail. Their copywritten independent properties first leased by Gregarious, then bought outright as their parent companies folded into GSS. Once mighty telecommunication and entertainment titans like Disney and Comcast were bought out after failing to adapt to the worsening times. Across the Pacific, companies like companies like Sony and Nintendo soon found themselves subsidiaries of GSS Hokkaido. Japanese internet users having abandoned reality for Halliday's virtual paradise on mass.
OASIS usage surpassed one billion users by 2027, caping out around three billion soon after that. The only reason it didn't grow higher is that the system was banned in most of Eurasia. Sales were limited to America's withdrawn cultural sphere. North and South America, Oceania, Southeast Asia, Japan, Korea and a few scattered parts of Africa. Europe had largely left the US's sphere after Britain had collapsed and Washington had left NATO. EU regulators saw the OASIS as an overstimulated nightmare. To which they ran the risk of losing their population forever.
In his own country however, people didn't see Halliday as their enslaver, but their saviour. He had given them somewhere to escape too. He, Ogden Morrow and their company grew immensely wealthy selling virtual space to companies to open shops in the OASIS, and from users through teleportation fees and virtual starship fuel and bullets.
Soon the awkward dev Chris had meet besides the catering table was worth trillions.
And more people joined his game everyday.
…
The world turned slowly but determinedly on its axis. Human civilization glimmered in the dark expanse of the cosmos. Its culture and politics going through the movements of their ever-changing dance.
Russia declared war on Ukraine. Shelling Kyiv to ruble.
In the OASIS Major League Pokémon Tournaments attracted tens of millions of viewers.
Fire gutted the British Library. Over a million irreplicable books lost.
Hogwarts alumni surpassed 100 million.
The Doge's palace crumbled into the Adriatic.
All many thousands of the named planets in the Star Wars galaxy were created down to smallest rock. Sometime after work was completed on the thousands more world unique to the Legends continuity.
China occupied North Korea, irrigating it as a province.
Mario Kart races were all the rage in the Mushroom Kingdom.
American occupiers died by the hundreds in Caracas.
People signed up for Starfleet in droves.
The Chinese invasion of Taiwan degraded into guerilla warfare. People's Liberation Army soldiers unleashing a brutality on Taipei that hadn't been seen in the Rape of Nanjing.
Super Smash tournaments always drew crowds.
Hundreds of Millions of souls starved on the plains of the Ganges.
Automatically Correct Haptic Dolls and standalone brothel sims made it so even the loneliest hikikomori could bed the girl of his dreams. From Mai Shiranui to Asuka Langley Sohru. Thousands of AI personalities were available the best part was none of them were programed to say no.
On and on it went.
Then one day in 2040 the world stopped spinning.
James Donovan Halliday died in his sleep.
…
It was late 2044.
Blaineley's set had changed drastically over the years. In truth most people didn't sit down in person for talk shows anymore. Preferring to have their OASIS avatar beamed in as a hologram or to skip the middle man entirely and just have the interview in the simulation. Still he preferred showing up physically. Chris was always keen to avoid the OASIS as much as possible. Especially after Halliday's death.
Blaineley smiled at him over a pair of thick rimmed glasses. She was back to her natural colour, a dark brunette now going grey. Fashion wise she looked like she had stepped right out of a John Hughes film with her perm and her red pantsuit. Hardly surprising. The 1980s had been the look all decade. Halliday had assured that.
"So. Chris. Congratulations on wrapping the new season."
"Thanks."
"How many is that now 48?"
"49."
"49!" Blaineley clapped her hands to her mouth. It was a genuine expression, the two of them had gotten closer with age. By now they were old friends.
"You must be getting something special ready for next season then? The big five-O."
Chris smirked knowingly, Blaineley at once picked up on the gesture.
"You do have something planned!"
Chris brushed a hand through his hair causally. His stylist had only recently talked him into showing a little grey. At 65 she insisted he was due to show his age.
"My lips are sealed." He taunted. Blaineley pouted.
"Ready? Not even a hint?"
"Let's keep talking and maybe I'll change my mind later."
"Chris you're the devil."
"Always have been."
They shared a brief laugh.
"Let's talk about nearly fifty seasons of Total Drama then? How are the rantings these days?"
Chris drew in air through his teeth. "They've been better yeah. We've been down since the start of the decade and…"
"The Contest?"
"Yeah."
The contest.
That had been Halliday's last will.
When he had died without an heir in 2040 he promised his entire vast fortune to whomever could find an Easter Egg he had hidden in the OASIS first. The only clue he gave in the video will he had emailed to every OASIS user at the time of his death was to study his interests, most of which came from the 1980's hence the current fashion trends. Even if had already been five years and most people had lost interest Halliday's contest was still The contest, and it cast a shadow over every other competition out there.
Ever since their chance meeting Chris had suspected Halliday had it out for him. Now he knew, the guy must have hated his guts.
"These days there's so many Total Drama fan seasons being hosted in the OASIS. Whole planets covered in copies of Wawanakwa. Of course being in the OASIS they manage things far crazier than what you could get away with out here." Blaineley said.
Chris nodded. "You're not wrong dude."
"Chris it must have crossed you mind to move the show to virtual reality."
"Absolutely not."
"Really?"
Chris made a dismissive wave of his right hand.
"Total Drama is real. It's about real people. We moved away from that once and were burned for it alright?"
"Then aren't you considered about shrinking viewership?"
"What for? They'll be back for the fiftieth!"
"Will they?"
"They totally will."
"And it doesn't involve the OASIS."
"Nope
Blaineley folding one leg over the other and looked at him bemused.
"Well now I have to know your plans."
Chris beamed at her superiorly.
"Trust me you will soon enough."
…
But whatever Chris had had planned, no one would know. A month later he appeared for another interview, solemnly announcing he was retiring from entertainment.
Hardly anyone had heard from him since.
…
Eleven years later. Blaineley sat on grand set by her lonesome. Time was carving lines in her once round face now, and her hair was white and straight once more.
"Tonight, I've been invited here to Gregarious Simulation System's branch here in scenic Vancouver, Colombia to have the pleasure of speaking to the most powerful man on Earth. He and his friends have been all anyone's talking about since they won Halliday's contest in 2046.
Please put your hands together for the Richest man alive. Our President. Wade Owen Watts!"
An wailing electric guitar cover of Hail to the Chief screamed over the studios sound system as a handsome twenty-nine-year-old man strutted onto stage.
He shook Blaineley's hand they waved to the audience who were shrieking wildly. The president walked to the edge of the stage then moon walked for them. Somehow the crowd got louder. He bowed. Then collapsed into his chair.
"How's it hanging O'Halloran?" Wade said playfully. Straightening out his collar. The President wore an oversized grey suit jacket, and a large loosely tied cream and indigo striped tie. It was his signature look, one he had 'barrowed' from Buckaroo Banzai.
"President Watts. Thank you for taking the time to do this interview."
"Of course. Always happy to visit Atr3mis's home town."
"How is the first lady anyway?"
Wade smiled blissfully. "Still the perfect woman."
"You're ten year's coming up next spring isn't it?"
"Yeah. Right you are. Thanks for remembering."
"My pleasure."
The President smiled coyly "But that's not the only anniversary coming up here in the North you know."
"Oh really?"
"Blaineley you remember a little show called Total Drama don't you?"
The audience laughed as did Blaineley.
"Of course. I was a contestant on the most popular season."
"Well, you were only on two episodes under nebulous circumstance so that's debatable." Wade argued. "But that's besides the point…"
He sat up and grabbed a remote from his pocket. A large screen behind him began playing clips from Total Drama.
"If Halliday's Hunt was the greatest contest in American history, then Total Drama was the greatest in Canadian history. In that way they're connected. However theirs one key difference. Halliday's contestant had a clear ending."
"You won."
"I won. But Total Drama never had that kind of closure. Mclean promised a fiftieth season but never delivered. Now here's a fun fact Blaineley you might not of heard before. Did you know that after Total Drama Incorporated went public in the 2020s the Canadian government purchase majority stakes in the company."
"Really?
Wade nodded and displayed a bar graph on the screen behind him.
"The show made so much money for Canada in tourist dollars that Ottawa found it a matter of national interest to keep the show running."
The screen behind him changed to a map of the North American continent.
"Now of course. Canadians and Americans had always been the same people. The only reason we didn't share a country was down to a bunch of historical horseshit from two-hundred years ago. Six years ago me and Art3mis set that mistake right. We loved each too much to be foreigners to one another, so we merged our countries. Which though we didn't know it at the time, made us the proud owners of Total Drama. And so the task of restoring the show belongs to us."
Blaineley looked up in mild surprised.
"So that's the announcement? You're taking over as host of Total Drama?"
Wade laughed.
"Good guess but no. Turns out being President and saving the world doesn't leave you with a lot of free time. And before you ask, Chris Mclean said no. So I had the outsource. I figured if I couldn't get Chris I'd get someone both he and Halliday looked up to."
From just offstage an ancient looking man was rolled onto set by a stage assistant. He sat in his chair with the rigid posture of a corpse. His skin was like taught leather. His milky eyes gaze off into some distant place. All that remained of his hair were a few bone white tufts along the side of his head.
Blaineley squinted at the man for a several seconds before her makeup caked eyes lit up with recognition.
"Conner O'Gleeson?" She asked.
The old man in the chair cackled like a gargoyle.
"Thought you've seen the last of me didn't you?" Conner asked, his voice weakened by age.
"I thought you were retired?" Blaineley said. Conner scoffed.
"Nonsense. I'm a hundred and seven years young. Plenty of vigor left for television. As well as a couple of others things ladies."
He gave the audience and exaggerated wink. They responded with uncertain silence.
"Conner O'Gleeson was the king of late night almost a century ago in the 1975 and 1993." Wade explained. "However his show never got a proper send off. For all his contributions to television he was canceled unceremoniously. The world's still very lucky to have him around. His mind's still sharp has it's ever been."
"Sharper than some might like it." Conner quipped. "I'm the baba yaga to my live-in nurses."
"I'd like to give Conner one last chance to host, to make up for what happened to him all those years ago."
"Took you long enough!"
"The only problem is his body."
"It's like I'm trapped in cement."
"Fortunately…" Said Wade. "We've got one last piece of unfinished business here. One I've been keeping quiet for a long time."
Another stagehand walked forward and brought the president a large silver egg. He opened it, and took out two items. A standard OASIS visor and a strange headset.
"This…" President Wades said. "…Is James Donovan Halliday's final invention. The OASIS Neural Interface, and it was waiting for me inside the Easter Egg I won from winning his contest back in '46."
Hushed gasped ran through the audience as Wade carefully placed the O.N.I onto Conner's fragile scalp.
"I took everything in my power not the start messing with the thing the moment I found it. Luckily I had foresight to call Art3mis and let her talk me out of it. I'm glad I did. Halliday may have been a once in a civilization genius but even he left this thing with a few kinks. Fortunately after a decade of workshopping in secret I'm proud to say we've ironed out all the bugs. Ready for your apotheosis Conner?"
"Couldn't be more ready if I tried." Conner said. A thinned lipped smiled had spread over his worn features.
Wade attached the ONI rig to Conner's forehead and the old man when limp.
"Is he in the OASIS?" Blaineley asked.
"You'll see." Wade said.
He flipped on the screen above them once more.
The feed now showed Conner standing on a talk show set. The stark different between the man in chair on stage and the man on screen was startling.
It didn't merely look that Conner was using an avatar of younger self, he simply looked like his younger self. Down to the smallest detail he was as he had been back in the 1980's. A perfectly healthy man in his mid thirties, with a full head of shoulder length orange hair with two working legs. The minutia of his moments were perfectly rendered, utterly lifelike without any hint of being stuck in the uncanny valley. Normally such tiny movements who required a top-of-the-line OASIS rig, and something akin to a haptic mo-cap suit to capture the users real body movements. But Conner had none of the above, and he wasn't even moving.
"Conner can you hear us?" Wade called.
Conner looked at the screen and beamed.
"Loud and clear."
"How's everything feel?"
"Like a dream!" Conner beamed. He grabbed an apple from a fruit bowl on the desk behind him and bit into it. "…And it tastes even better."
Another rush of excitement ran through the audience. For as impressive as it was, the OASIS was still just a fancy video game. No one had ever been able to taste anything in it.
"Halliday had always said that being human totally sucked most of the time, and that Video games are the only thing that make life bearable." Wade announced. "Mclean always said his game would be cheapen if it wasn't set in reality. Well, it turns out at the end of his life by imprinting data directly into the mind, Halliday found a way to make his video game undisguisable from reality."
"Now anything and everything is possible." Conner promised. "We can have camera's anywhere, do anything, go anyplace, meet anyone. Isn't that right Jeremy?"
An oozing mass of something resembling a living mass of bubble gum emerged onto the screen. Blaineley let out a noise of discomfort.
"What is that?"
"An old in joke from the O'Gleeson show." Wade chuckled.
"…And I'll thank you to not be rude to my sugar bear." Conner scowled.
"Want to go say hi in person?" Wade offered. Conner grinned.
"What kind of question is that? Of course I do."
Conner and Jeremy were both projected onto the stage via a hologram. The younger Conner still looking as real as his old counterpart. He and Jeremy took centre stage. Eyeing the excited audience keenly.
"Way back in World Tour, Chris cheeped out, instead of traveling the world he built a couple of sets on a soundstage and called it a day. Now things can be different. As me as your guide and Wade supplying the budget we can go anywhere and have it be as real as if you were really there."
Wade cocked an eyebrow.
"Has anyone ever wanted to feel the rush of flying in X-Wing? Or smelt a summer festival in the Shire? Or tasted some of Wonka's chocolate? Well for our contestants, all this and more will be par for the course."
"Fiction and reality made inseparable." Conner proclaimed. "That is the power of the ONI."
"Amazing." Blaineley said quietly. "So how is thing going to work? Contestants will pop into some kind of heighten OASIS simulation for their challenges everyday?"
Wade shook his head.
"No. Too immersion breaking."
Something rose onto a stage. It was a large round grey pod of some sort, slightly largely than a human being.
"I'd like introduce everyone to our team's special addition to Halliday's invention. The Long-term ONI Temporal Utility System. Or a Lotus pod."
"Something to look after this old sack of bone while we and the cast are off adventuring." Conner said, as he jabbed a finger at his decrepit body, still lying motionless it it's chair.
"All our contestants vitals we'll be taken care of as they explore a stand-alone sim called ARCADIA." Wade explained. "They could be plugged into the system for a year then wake up healthier than had been when they got in."
"Nothing less than full immersion for our contestants." Conner said proudly. "They'll all really going to believe they're really there."
"They'll still know they're in a game though won't they?" Blaineley asked. Conner and Wade laughed at her.
"Oh, ye of little fate!" Conner cackled. "We've got one last trick up our selves don't we Wade?"
"Blaineley what's the ultimate goal of any form of entertainment?" Wade challenged.
"To entertain?"
"Think more specific."
"To escape?"
"How?" Urged the President.
"By experiencing things through someone else's shoes."
Wade snapped his fingers.
"Bingo."
He turned to the audience again.
"One of the coolest things I experience on Halliday's Hunt was when the First Gate made me act out the entirety of the movie WarGames through the Matthew Broadrick's character David. Now a days Flicksyncs are common as dirt but that first time shattered by mind into a million pieces. To this day it's one of my favorite premises in the OASIS, and for Total Drama I wanted to take things even further."
Over the past half century TD's seen just about every personality type try and compete. But you know who this game hasn't seen as a competitor? John Matrix, John McClane.
"Batman." Conner said. "Superman."
"Luke Skywalker…" Wade continued. "... Han Solo, Princess Leia, Indiana Jones, Homer Simpson."
"Marge Simpson!" Conner proclaimed. "Bart Simpson! Lisa Simpson!"
"Anyone your heart desires." Wade promised to the awestruck audience. "Tell us who you want to be and we'll make so when the simulation starts you'll wake up thinking you were always them."
"Also apparently Mclean had a fondness for shorter seasons." Conner said. "Well, that's bullcrap."
"Horseshit." Wade agreed. "Our season is going to be the largest in Total Drama history. We've got twenty-seven golden tickets to give out. Tell us your avatar and why you think they'll win and one of them could be yours. It's that easy. The contestant is open to anyone and everyone."
The crowd had broken out into a continuous cheer of excitement now. Conner raised to his voice to call over them.
"Survive the adventure of a lifetime and we'll make you rich beyond your wildest dreams! Grand Prize is one! Billion! Dollars!"
The crowd was unconcealable now. All of them, Blaineley including on their feet and cheering wildly.
Wade shouted over them clearly as excited as they were.
"I founded the North American Union so we could outdo everything Canada and America could do on their own, including their entertainment. Mclean snubbed fiction, Halliday snubbed reality but like our nations they're stronger together!
Everyone though Total Drama was ending, but now with the ONI the possibilities are endless! Total Drama is Endless!"
The crowd roared. Wade smiled.
"The Greatest contest in history is about to begin! Our lucky winner is out there North America! You want to know who they are? All you have to do is look in the mirror! The answer might be staring you in the face."