Nineteen stood by a large column near the cafe in North Central Airport, West Virginia. The young man was buzzing with excitement. This was he first time he'd ever left his home country of Australia. His parents had never been big on travel. Nor in fact had they been particularly big on any technology, leading them to live a rare OASIS free lifestyle. Nineteen of course didn't follow this choice, although it did allow him to make his avatar as similar to himself as he wanted, without risking anything happening to his family.

Almost just to prove that point, his avatar looked almost exactly like he did. Same sandy blonde hair, same brown eyes. Of course, he was a little more muscular in the OASIS, but everyone was, so he didn't count that as really changing anything.

A young blonde woman approached him, dragging a small suitcase behind her. She smiled, gazing at him with big blue eyes. "Going outside, is highly overrated. Don't you agree?" She asked, with a thick Norwegian accent.

Nineteen blinked. That was the code he'd given GingerSnap. He had expected her to be a little more... Ginger. "It certainly is, miss... Well I suppose it's just Snap now isn't it."

The woman laughed, extending a hand. "Please, call me Anitia."

"Riley," he nodded, shaking her hand.

"Well, it is nice to meet you outside the OASIS, Riley." Anitia smirked, leaning back on the column beside him. She looked him up and down. "You seem... Surprised."

"Well you're not exactly what I was expecting."

Anitia laughed. "Of course not. The whole point is to make your avatar look different. Then again, I'm relieved to see you're not a balding middle aged man called... I don't know, Chuck or something."

This time Riley laughed. "No, I'm not Chuck. Honestly I'm glad you're not either..." He searched for something else to say. "Should we, you know, head off?"

She waved her hand towards the exit, grinning. "Lead the way, Ninety Nine." The Australian picked up his briefcase, and headed out into West Virginia.

The city wasn't pretty. Not many cities were anymore. Overpopulation lead to a larger consumption of resources, and larger consumption of resources lead to pollution... A lot of pollution. Most of the world had fallen into disrepair, or at least most of the major cities and countries. According to Anitia, Norway wasn't anywhere near as bad is it appeared to be anywhere else, however the government generally preferred to keep that on the down low, in an attempt to keep it that way.

"Where are we going anyway?" Anitia asked after a while of walking aimlessly through city streets. It was beginning to get dark, and the people around them began to get more and more shady looking.

Riley looked up from his phone, peering down the grimy street signs. "Just about... Here." He stopped in front of a small shop, with boarded up and broken windows, and bullet holes in the metal door.

"What is this place exactly?"

Riley sighed. "You'll see..." He pushed open the door and stepped inside. Rows of guns covered every wall, floor to ceiling. A small man sat behind the counter on a stool, eyeing them as they walked in.

"Can I help you?" He asked as Riley approached the counter.

The young man pulled a large wad of money from his pocket and slid it across the counter. "Two guns. Small, concealable, if possible. And bullets."

The man smirked and began scan the walls behind him. "That's not... Suspicious or anything?" Anitia whispered to Riley.

The shop owner obviously heard her. "Not anymore, darlin'. Used to be, before the OASIS. Nowadays most folks wouldn't go anywhere at night without one of these," He placed two small handguns on the table, "You weren't planning on doing anything suspicious with them, I hope?"

"Not at all," Riley shrugged, adjusting his collar, "We just moved in nearby and... Well, like you said, wouldn't wanna be without them."

The store owner shrugged, flicked through Riley's wad of cash, and handed him what was presumably the right amount of change. Without another word, Riley snatched the guns off the counter, and left the store, Anitia following him out into the street.

Riley handed her a pistol. "Where did you get that money?" She asked, glancing distastefully at the weapon before shoving it in a bag.

"OASIS credits is the most stable currency in the world, and if you recall, I took out an entire planets worth of Hellscape Avatars," Riley loaded and cocked his own gun, before sliding it into the large pocket of a hoodie, where it fit easily, "I've got train tickets to take us to the hackers location. It leaves in about twenty minutes."

"I'll hail a taxi," Anitia sighed, standing at the side of the road and cursing under her breath in Norwegian. It wasn't long before a yellow cab had pulled up, and the pair were on their way...

Riley stepped out of the taxi several hours later. A thin red line on the distant horizon showed that dawn was slowly approaching. He reached back in and nudged Anitia, who jerked awake, before snatching up her bag and scrambling out onto the street. The self driving taxi pulled away from them as they surveyed the small town.

Compared to all of the overcrowded and sprawling cities Riley had grown up in, this was a big surprise. They stood directly at the mouth of the main street, from which the entire town was visible. The road ahead only housed a few small shop fronts, a motel, and bar running along either side. Side streets lead into small residential areas, with large backyards full of dead grass and thin, aged trees, which looked like they would snap in half in a strong wind.

"This isn't where you'd expect to find a hacker..." Anitia said, peering down the road for any sign of life.

"You wouldn't expect to find one anywhere," Riley yawned, "That's the point. Come on." He shouldered his rucksack and  began down the street, occasionally checking his phone to make sure he was going in the right direction. It wasn't long before they came upon a small house, directly at Riley's coordinates.

It was small and squarish, with dirty glass windows and peeling paint. A large "For Sale" sign was planted securely I tot he ground out the front. "Are you sure this is the place?" Anitia asked, walking up and peering into one of the windows, "It looks empty."

"Can I help you pair?" Asked a woman's voice from their right. The two turned to see a woman in a faded purple dressing gown standing on the front porch of the house next door. "We're you looking for something?" She raised an eyebrow accusingly.

Anitia swallowed, turning to look at Riley. "We're uh... We're reporters," He said uncertainly, "We heard something happened recently here?"

The woman looked him up and down. "Certainly did. One of them hackers from inside the OASIS. We had police and all sorts storming the street for three days, wouldn't you believe it. Not surprised, mind you. Most horrible young man I've ever met. Never left the house, made the poor shop boy deliver all his groceries to him. Honestly somewhat glad they got rid of him when they d—"

"Well, thank you for your help," Anitia interrupted her, "But we'd best be off. Have a lovely day." The woman looked rather put out at this, but didn't object as Anitia grabbed Riley's arm and dragged him back towards the main road. The Australian looked about ready to shoot the woman.

"Nothing!" He yelled as they reached the hotel, "A whole trip overseas to look for this guy, and nothing! Bloody goddamn nothing!" Anitia would have made an effort to console him, but was too annoyed herself to even bother. "And now, now, I have to get another plane back home already, and explain to everyone where the hell I've been for the last three days!"

The pair stood in the Main Street for a while. "Okay look," Anitia suggested, "How about we stay here for a while, log into the OASIS, share the news, and then head back, okay?" Riley seemed to agree, but he was so annoyed it just came out as a series of grunts. They rented a room at the motel, and logged into the OASIS.

* * *

Thaimes paced around the living room section of his home base, considering what had happened in his meeting with Parzival. And considering the fact that he had actually just had a conversation with Parzival. A notification appeared in the corner of his Avatars vision.

THE19 has invited you to a chat room.

Without pausing to consider it, he tapped on the link, and immediately found himself standing in the same living room as the last time. Nineteen and GingerSnap were already there, and it only took a few seconds for Reaper to arrive. Nineteen explained their situation quite aggressively, before the others even had a chance to sit down.

"You guys met up in the real world?" Reaper asked impressed, "Wow."

"More importantly, you met with Parzival? And he told you everything?" Nineteen asked.

Thaimes nodded. "Yeah. I sent you an invitation, but you must have already been on your way.  Only Reaper and Morte turned..." He swore, his avatar jumping to his feet, "You guys haven't heard from Morte have you? His avatar flew across the room and then," Thaimes snapped his fingers.

All of the others shook their heads. Nineteen seemed the most disturbed by this. "You don't think they found where he lived do you?" Reaper asked, glancing at the others, "You don't think Hellscape... You know..."

Nineteen shook his head. "No, Vincent was too smart for that. Or at least I hope he was."

"This is bad," GingerSnap muttered, "Really bad. We started with six, and now we're down to four. How long before something else happens?"

"To be fair, Ninja tried to kill me first." Nineteen chipped in.

The four sat in the chat room quietly, waiting for someone else to say something. Eventually, Reaper left, and Thaimes was about to do so. "Oh my God." GingerSnap muttered under her breath. She made a news feed visible and spun it around.

One of the OASIS server houses in east London had been blown up, and based on graffiti marks found on the site, police were suspecting it was the work of Hellscape, finally making their debut outside the OASIS. Multiple investigations were in progress, attempting to link this attack with the destruction of a home in northern England.

Thaimes swore, running his avatars fingers through his silver hair. "That's... That's..." He shook his head, "That's not good."

"You think?" Nineteen asked, forcing a laugh.

"No," Thaimes held up his hands, "No, you don't get it, that's..." He took a deep breath, contemplating what he was about to say, "That's only a few streets away from my house... In the real world." The chat room was silent. GingerSnap and Nineteen stared at Thaimes, seconds slowly passing as they all searched for something to say.

"We're going there." Nineteen announced.

GingerSnap turned to him, "What?"

"This could be out biggest break. We have nothing here we can go off. But there..." He smirked, be logging out of the chat room.

"Here we go," GingerSnap sighed She looked at Thaimes, who stood there awkwardly, "I don't suppose you'd want to meet us... You know, while we're there. You could be a big help."

The silver haired man considered it for a long time, "O-Okay," he said quietly, "Here's a... Here's a cafe. I'll meet you guy there in two days time." An email appeared in GingerSnap's field of view, containing the address.

"Thank you." She said nodding, before waving, and disappearing, leaving Thaimes alone in the chat room.

"Yeah well, my life is already on the line." He said to himself, before his avatar vanished, and the chat room blinked out of its virtual existence...