She looked around and saw a small wall that looked like somewhere she could stand for a bit more height and made her way over, doing her best not to jostle people too much.

"Can I get your attention?" She put every shred of public speaking training she could into her voice doing her best to project without sounding like she's yelling.

A few people turned to focus on her.

"Please, panicking won't help us."

A few more. That would have to be enough for a start.

"This situation sucks, it shouldn't have happened. A lot of people messed up by letting this happen. We have to deal with it though."

"Deal with it how?" yelled a woman.

"The same way we were going to beat the game before all this, by working together. The advertisements for this game pitched it as having a lot of similarities with ARGs and anyone who's played one of those before knows that the hardest puzzles are always solved with a lot of people knuckling down and collaborating."

There were a few vague murmurs of agreement.

"What if I'm no good at puzzles?" another person called out.

"Well, I at least came for the fighting, I assume there'll be plenty of room for people willing to do that. If that's not your cup of tea the other pitch for the game was how many things there are to do. I'm willing to bet that a lot of those end up being important somehow to getting out."

"What if I'm just not good at anything?" A man heckled.

"Well, I'm not sure I entirely believe that, but even if it's true, it seems like you have a lot of time to practice."

"Okay, say you're right. What should we be doing now?" asked a woman.

"Hey, how do we know you aren't like working for her. That you're not some NPC trying to shove us on the rails?" That from a man.

"I'm not an NPC. I don't have a way to prove it though so it's up to you to listen to my ideas and decide for yourself if they're good ones. If you don't want to take my advice nobody is forcing you to. As for what my advice is, I think you should try to find a buddy and claim apartments near each other so you can support each other. Separately from that, figure out where you're gonna get food, figure out what else you need to make it through the day. Once that's settled, just try things. See if you can find your niche."

"That's... not bad advice," admitted the heckler.

"I believe we can get through this. I don't think it'll be easy. And there will definitely be some people hurt along the way. But there is a way out. We just need to find it."

"What if there isn't? What if it's some kind of sick joke and we're all just trapped forever?"

"I can't promise anything. But even if Decker thought she was lying about there being a way out, I still think trying is worthwhile. There's a power to hope and maybe there's a glitch or an exploit in the game. Heck, that might be true if she's telling the truth. There might be an easier way out than she planned. Have you ever heard of any video game, any computer program at all without bugs?"

"That's true," "yeah" and other noises of agreement cam in response.

"I've said my piece now. I hope it makes a difference for some of you. Good luck." She stepped down off the wall.

A woman stepped over and spoke up. "Hey, do you have a buddy? My name is Vivian."

"I'm Alice, and no I don't. I assume you're asking in the hopes of being mine?"

"Yeah."

"Sounds good, let's see what's available."