""Welcome to the game, ...."" Sydney Bloom, a loner VR hobbyist, stumbles on a whole new dimension of VR when she inadvertently discovers that she can ""pull"" anyone into VR with her via the phone lines. When she innocently uses it on a man she is dating, she learns, to her horror, that he's a serial rapist/killer. To complicate matters, her inquiries into VR have brought her to the attention of a super-secret intelligence operation called ""the Committee"". Her life is changed forever by the words""Welcome to the game, Sydney Bloom ....""

On her first VR assignment for The Committee, Sydney must find an unhappy and spiteful teenage genius - who after making a momentous discovery has run away from the top secret weapons research establishment where he worked - before he can do any harm. During her search, Sydney must try to deal with her own sense of solitude.

When an armed man takes hostages in an air traffic control tower, Sydney is ordered to establish a VR link. In the process, she discovers a cover-up over the reason for a crash several years earlier: the crash was actually caused by a bomb planted by the Committee in an attempt to assassinate Oliver.

Duncan wakes up one morning to discover that he is a wealthy and successful artist, and that it was Samantha - not Sydney - who survived the car crash as a child. Everything is turned upside down and the lives of all the characters are quite different. It all turns out to be VR scenario orchestrated by the very much alive Dr. Bloom to test Duncan's loyalty.