Chapter 6 — Virtually True

Chapter 6 of the Class 10 English Communicative Literature Reader, "Virtually True", is a science fiction story by Paul Stewart about a boy named Michael who discovers that a coma patient, Sebastian Shultz, has become trapped inside a set of interactive psycho-drive video games. The story explores how the boundary between virtual reality and the real world dissolves when Michael repeatedly enters the games to rescue Sebastian, eventually succeeding in the war-zone game Warzone.

• The Psycho-Drive Games and Virtual Reality — Michael and his father buy a virtual reality visor, glove, and interactive psycho-drive games at a Computer Fair. These games — Wildwest, Dragonquest, Jailbreak, and Warzone — allow the player to control the action through thought, creating an immersive experience where the virtual world feels completely real.
• Sebastian Shultz Trapped in the Games — Sebastian Shultz was using his laptop to play the same psycho-drive games when he was injured in a motorway accident. Michael's theory is that the computer saved Sebastian's memory on disk at the moment of impact, and that memory ended up on Michael's computer via the stolen games sold at the Computer Fair.
• The Rescue Attempts Across Four Games — Sebastian communicates with Michael through printed messages from the games, asking for help across Wildwest (he is shot as the second sheriff), Dragonquest (he is caught by the dragon in the castle), Jailbreak (he falls from the prison roof), and finally Warzone, where Michael pulls him into a helicopter and succeeds.
• The Newspaper Twist and Reality Confirmed — Michael reads a newspaper headline — "Miracle Recovery" — revealing that the real Sebastian Shultz woke from a coma after doctors feared he might never recover. The story closes when Michael receives a grateful email from Sebastian, confirming that the virtual rescues were literally true.
• Theme: Reality vs. Virtual Reality — The story questions what is real: Sebastian's consciousness existed inside a video game, Michael's actions in a virtual world had real-world consequences, and the computer's memory proved more reliable than human consciousness. The final line — "Everything that I've described is true — Virtually!" — captures this deliberate ambiguity.

1. 01Author: Paul Stewart (born June 1955), British children's writer known for The Edge Chronicles and The Far Flung Adventure Series, written with illustrator Chris Riddell.
2. 02Genre: Science fiction / speculative fiction set in a near-future where interactive psycho-drive games controlled by thought are available to consumers.
3. 03Main characters: Michael (narrator, the player) and Sebastian Shultz (14-year-old schoolboy from South London, trapped in the games while in a coma).
4. 04The four games Michael enters are Wildwest (saloon and shootout), Dragonquest (castle, princess, and dragon), Jailbreak (prison escape), and Warzone (war-torn city with tanks, jeeps, and a helicopter).
5. 05Sebastian communicates between games by sending printed messages from Michael's printer, asking him to try the next game.
6. 06Michael's theory: during the motorway accident, Sebastian's memory was saved to his laptop's psycho-drive game; the stolen games were later sold at a Computer Fair and bought by Michael's father.
7. 07The hardware used includes a virtual reality visor, glove, headphones, and a high-spec Pentium PC (referred to as "the Powerbase").
8. 08Sebastian wakes from his coma in real life at the same moment Michael successfully rescues him in Warzone, scoring 40,000,000.
9. 09The story ends with an email from Sebastian thanking Michael and telling him to keep the games.