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With the press of a tiny button on its side, the glasses could also switch back and forth like polarized lenses between the virtual world and the real world And when you looked at the real world through it, you could see virtual things hovering over real-life objects and places Dragons flying above your street The names of stores, restaurants, and people

To deaame was called Warcross

Warcross was pretty si to take the other tea their own What made it spectacular were the virtual worlds the battles were set in, each one so realistic that putting on your glasses was like dropping you right into that place

As the radio program went on, I learned that Hideo, born in London and raised in Tokyo, had taught hi afterward, he built his first pair of NeuroLink glasses at his father’s computer repair shop, with his neuroscientist mother’s input His parents helped fund a set of one thousand glasses for hi theht into a hundred thousand Then, a million, tenoffers Lawsuits flew over the patents Critics argued about how the NeuroLink engine would change everyday life, travel, medicine, the military, education "Link Up" was the na hit

And everyone--everyone--played Warcross So for hours Others played by si a virtual safari Still others played by wearing their glasses while walking around the real world, showing off their virtual pet tigers or populating the streets with their favorite celebrities

However people played, it becaaze shifted fro oninHow did a boy only three years older than me take the world by storram ended andhour Then, gradually, I uncurled and reached for one of nments

It was from my Introduction to Computer Science class The first problem on it was to spot the error in a si an eleven-year old Hideo in the sa off into nothing He would have solved this probleht conjured an olds were printed that looked identical It was asking the reader to figure out the difference between the to him with crossed ares The two drawings are exactly the salasses There was still paint and glue stuck in his hair fro with fabrics earlier in the day I’d need to help him cut the sticky strands out later Look closer, he’d replied He’d grabbed the pencil tucked behind his ear and e Think about a painting hanging on a wall Without using any tools, you can still tell if it’s crooked--even by a tiny bit It just feels off Right?

I’d shrugged Yeah, I guess so

Huestured at the two drawings again with his paint-stained fingers You have to learn to look at the whole of so, not just the parts Relax your eyes Take in the entire iaze That had been when I’d finally spotted the difference, the tinyexcitedly at it

Dad had smiled at me See? he’d said Every locked door has a key, En over and over in my mind Then I did as he said--I leaned back and took in the code all at once Like it was a painting Like I was searching for the point of interest

And almost immediately, I saw the error I reached for my school laptop, opened it, and typed out the corrected code

It worked Hello, World! said ram

To this day, I can’t properly describe how I felt in that , on the screen To realize that, with three little lines of text, I had the power to coears in ing for another proble, faster and faster, until I finished not only that ho inheart beneath it

If I could solve these proble And if I could control soive myself for the one problem that I could never have solved, the one person I could never have saved Everyone has a different way of escaping the dark stillness of their mind This, I learned, was ht for the first time in months The next day and the day after that and every day since, I channeled every bit ofabout code and Warcross and the NeuroLink that I could get my brains on