We're all in this virtual space together.
Alioth

You wake up Alone in a virtual space.

What do you do?

Somewhere in the distant swirling galaxies of the universe, a lone giant ark of a ship sailed seemingly unhindered through the blues and purples of the vastness of space. On the outside it appeared smooth and sleek; swimming through space like a fish would glide through water. In big bold letters on the exterior walls of the ship read the name ‘Astraia.’ Named after the star-bright maiden in Greek mythology, she silently played through the stars like a lively goddess in all her beauty. The ship was long and narrow, with great delicate fins extending from either side. The outer walls were a dual colored metallic texture, and depending on how one viewed them and what angle they either appeared bright, shining silver, or a warm liquid gold. Towards the front of the ship several small porthole-like windows were present, belonging to the rooms of those ranked higher within the inner workings of the ship’s government. In the very front a large expansive window could be opened and closed to let in a glorious view of the passing galaxies, a sight only privy to Her Majesty, herself. No other living thing stepped in the room to behold the grace bestowed by Mother Nature to the last of the people of Earth. The window opened in a delicate curve, much like the rest of the ship operated. Not one hard line was found on this ship, creating its dimensions through curves and bows, with all the grace and liquidity of flowing water. The Astraia powered itself seamlessly, no large or bulky propulsion systems present, but instead an arc like area around the back of the ship moved the craft through the vast atmosphere less space.

Within this complex spaceship laid hallways of vibrant colors and textures, all creating the vast tapestry of the spacecraft Astraia. The ship was divided into several residence sections of declining wealth and importance, a wide and expansive space that could be transformed for any sort of entertainment, a booming city life - that of course had its own slums, and a hidden citadel area where it was presumed the Empress mainly stayed guarded by her own personal, handpicked civilians that had gone through rigorous training. The residential area was made up of tower of individual livings pods that stacked one atop another until it reached high around the walls of the ship. Great, long towers covered the majority of the inner walls of the ship, pressed as close as architecturally possible to still leave room for the inner area of the ship to contain enough entertainment to sustain whole generations of humanity for a lifetime. These living pods ranged widely in size, with high ranking officials having large expansive penthouses, with ordinary jobless citizens living in places no bigger than a small apartment space. The spaces were furnished with hyper modern furniture, consisting of graceful curves and lined with iridescent rope lights. All rooms also had a mood matching capability, which immediately altered itself to suit the needs and purposes of the owner if they had their neurons linked with the internal core of the living pod. One merely had to think of something, and the walls around them would provide the utmost compatibility to the need or want in question. All non residential areas of the ship were designed with a certain flair and style of luxury in mind. City sections were filled with towering skyscrapers attempting to reach the heavens that they were already sailing through, the lack of space outward forcing life to develop upward. Glittering gold mixed with velvet purple, trimmed with a vibrant line of LED lights to coat almost the entire interior of the ship in a soft pinkish glow; bathed in this light being all of the last remaining members of humanity, now venturing through space on their stellar journey from their homeland of Earth due to the rapid collapse of civilization. Thousands of cities had collapsed; one by one falling to the raging virus that had slaughtered basically all of humanity save for a small colony that had been ruled by the woman who was now Empress of their spacecraft. She saw the cities around her falling, and had her people build a glorious spacecraft on which they were going to flee the Earth on. The Empress worked here citizens to the bone, and many workers never saw through the end of the project, so focused on the harsh deadline of mass extinction that they worked themselves to death. The virus began its’ onslaught quietly, sneaking into a host’s nervous system and dwelling there for a few days before working its way to the bloodstream and corroding the arteries, causing victims to be fine one day and suddenly die the next. Blood soon bathed the streets of infected cities, and it was too late to save those who were already infected. Whole areas became danger zones, and soon most of humanity was pressed into tiny colonies at far corners of the world, warring for untainted space and trying to quell the horrifying virus. No one knew where the deadly disease had started from, but it spread like wildfire across the cramped and heavily populated cities of the Earth. Many people while on Earth theorized that it had all started due to a corrupt leader who wanted to control the entire myriad of human colonies. Others thought it was a scientist’s experiment gone terribly wrong. But none the less, soon barely any humans were left, and the Earth became uninhabitable due to the land itself being poisoned with the highly infectious plague.

Beautiful people populated this lone spacecraft of humankind, of every size, shape, color, and ethnicity. Those who had survived the deadly virus leapt at the opportunity to leave their old lives behind. The only surviving quality was untouched by the ferocious plague, leaving the mark of perfection that had come with advancement in beauty technology as well as vanity. The Empress easily bestowed new technologies onto these people, having been able to focus all the energy previously gone onto curing the humanity wiping virus into things that pleasured her and her people. She created a proverbial land of milk and honey, making it easy to cater to the every whim of the last of Earth’s creatures. Most humans had undergone surgery to look more appealing, or had their children’s genetics to be altered to be the best they could be.Humanity had now become a designer breed, no longer caring for self preservation when they had their lives assured to them. There was no need for war when they could easily be the lapdogs of the Empress, going on about their personal lives while she ruled and made their lives simple. They frolicked in their easygoing lives, perfectly content with the natural order of things under the great Empress, a powerful woman whom none have ever seen. These people lavished in the luxuries of their futuristic home, partaking in any activity that took up their fancy.

Two of such people were stretched out luxuriously in the beautifully radiant artificial sun, already having set up a picnic on the plush almost too green grass. They laughed and chattered meaningless chatter, the picture of a perfect utopia setting gone right. A calm and tranquil aura of listlessness surrounded the picture perfect couple. The two lazed and enjoyed each other’s company, making small observations they would forget in the next hour, or just merely leaning against each other. It seemed the world itself was on pause with how slow the two moved, enjoying every second of their day like they had not a care in the world and absolutely nowhere to be or nothing to do but sit there and enjoy each other’s company. Just as one of these people went to reach for another sandwich, a fiery haired young man tore between them like death was hot on his heels. An energetic smile was plastered on his face as he gleefully yelled an apology to the now frazzled perfect couple behind him. He continued running. He ran and ran and ran. Unlike most, this young man had somewhere to be.

This was a young man named Myos, the unlikely hero of our story - or at least, of his story.

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