The Annihilation of Foreverland

stuck inside Danny.
    Zin grabbed his arm and lifted him to his feet. “Lean against the sundial and stand there a minute.”
    It vibrated beneath his hand, penetrating into his chest until he was filled with warmth. The aches from Sid’s punishment faded. He noticed other sensations, too. The breeze brushed his cheeks. The grass tickled between his toes. He noticed the shouting and laughter from across the Yard. People running. People flying.
    “Welcome to Foreverland, Danny Boy.” Zin let go of his arm. “You’re all the way inside this time, my friend.”
    A body began to appear in the empty space only a few feet away. It first appeared translucent and ghostly, slowly solidified into one of the new pokes that came to the island shortly after Danny. He was sucking his thumb, eyes closed.
    “That’s what most people look like on the second round,” Zin said. “Don’t tell Sid, but I heard he sucked his thumb for five rounds.” He looked around, suspiciously, whispered too loudly, “Even sucked his thumb inside the Haystack.”
    Danny laughed.
    “How’d you do all that?” Danny asked, weakly.
    “What? Turn to water? Old trick, man. Sid was just trying to scare you. He knew you’d be lucid enough to feel it but not enough to control the pain. After this round, Danny Boy, you’ll be able to do anything. You can feel as much pleasure or as little pain as you want.”
    Zin splayed his hand on the sundial. He pulled a meat cleaver from his pocket and rammed it through the back of his hand. No blood. He didn’t even flinch.
    “See?” Zin held up his hand, the tip sticking through his palm. “If I wanted to feel that, I could. But I don’t.”
    Danny felt dizzy. The blade sticking through the flesh and people flying like birds and the ground swaying and—
    “Whoa, hold on there.” Zin placed Danny’s hands on the sundial before he fell over. “Hang on a bit longer, Danny Boy.”
    Feelings of seasickness subsided. The ground held still. The alternate reality felt normal again and the urge to vomit disappeared.
    “You good?” Zin asked.
    Danny nodded.
    “All right, give it another minute. The sundial is the center of Foreverland, where we feel most solid when we get inside. It helps to touch it when you first get here. After while, you’ll just hit the ground running.”
    “Where are we?”
    “You mean you don’t know?”
    Danny shook his head.
    Zin laughed. “We’re inside a computer, Danny Boy! This is a program, a digital environment. Our identity has been sucked out of our heads, and the needle is doing the sucking. Hell of lot better than freezing your ass off on that concrete floor, right?”
    Danny smiled. Yeah, it is.
    “Once you’re fully here, fully present, you’ll figure out how to control this body. You can dial up pleasure, push out pain, turn yourself into a baboon or swim to the bottom of the ocean… whatever you want to do. The sky’s the limit, Danny Boy. And the sky has none.”
    Zin pulled Danny from the sundial. They walked around the poke curled on the ground. Danny felt shaky the further they got from the sundial, but he was still solid. He had a new body, one he could control with a thought.
    “So what do you want to do, Danny Boy? What’ll it be?”
    Danny stepped away from Zin. The Yard was exactly like it was on the island. The same buildings, same trees. Even the Haystack. But it was different. It all felt interconnected. Danny could feel the grass shifting in the wind. He could feel it crush when a footstep landed. He sensed the birds singing and the crackle of heat as a fire erupted in the trees. He was one with everything.
    Not separate. But one. And the sky was the limit.
    “That,” Danny said. “I want to do that.”
    Zin looked up. “All right.”

    The island was lushly shaped like the state of South Carolina , dominated by trees with a bald spot of turf in the middle.
    Tears streamed down Danny’s cheeks in the cold wind. He kept his arms out for balance, like walking a tightrope for the first time, 3000 miles above the ground. Zin flew next to him on his back with his hands laced behind his head. For him, it was as thrilling as riding a bike for the thousandth time. For Danny, it was everything he imagined.
    The ocean was choppy, but the distant horizon disappeared in a gray haze. Even the sky above them looked more gray than blue, like they were inside a fuzzy dome.
    “What’s all that?” Danny shouted above the wind.
    “The Nowhere.”