“Yeah, you could go off to some nasty battlefield in the Civil War or fight dragons with a magic sword, fly spaceships, explore the freaky love shacks. But that stuff got old quick. In the end, nothing was more fascinating than bare-bones, dirt-in-your-face, gritty, get-me-out-of-here real life.”

Michael’s observation about the most thrilling part of the VirtNet being the part that imitates a (grittier) version of reality explores the novel’s theme of The Tensions Between Appearance and Reality. Michael’s interest in playing the games that come closest to paralleling the real world indicates that he seeks to make this boundary as blurry as possible, as this is where having a digital self holds the highest emotional impact.

“Never before had he been so relieved to be done with the VirtNet, done with a game, ready to get out of his box and breathe in the polluted air of the real world.”

Though Michael does not actually live in the real world, the fact that Lifeblood Deep has polluted air suggests that actual reality, in the world of The Eye of Minds, is an ecological dystopia. This adds a layer to the allure of the VirtNet, as it offers a world that, unlike the real world, has not been damaged by pollution and humans’ poor eco-conservation.

“Brystones; But the Wake is so boring. What’s the point?”

While Michael finds the version of the VirtNet that imitates reality to be the most interesting, Bryson’s comment here indicates that he, at least, does not find actual reality as intriguing as virtual reality. This comment takes on a different resonance after Michael’s identity as a Tangent is revealed, introducing the question as to whether or not reality is more fascinating to those consciousnesses that have never experienced it—something that is not resolved by the end of the first installment in the series, but which here speaks to The Mental Repercussions of Virtual Reality.

“I know the whole suicide negotiation thing is part of the Lifeblood experience stuff, but who could’ve known yours would be a real one?”

Despite Lifeblood’s purported reality, Sarah’s comment here indicates that the game presents psychologically challenging scenarios frequently to its players. The novel therefore indicates that, though the three teenagers see the VirtNet as more playground than prison at the beginning of the text, that they have been exposed to dangerous, traumatizing things even during their time spent “playing” in that world, thereby invoking The Mental Repercussions of Virtual Reality.

“Old geezers always know that the next generation is smarter than they’ll ever be at this stuff. I mean, we hang out in this place. We do know it better than anyone. We can do it because it’s not our job. It’s our hobby.”

Bryson’s comment about the greater suitability of young people to explore the VirtNet plays both with the conventions of young adult literature and common trends about early adopters of novel technologies. In YA novels, young people have power and agency because of their youth, not despite it. Video games and digital tech are often viewed as the domain of young people who grow up as “digital natives,” making them particularly adept for navigating digital spaces, as the text explores.

“[Olde Towne] was designed for two things: to provide good times and to drain people’s life savings. Things often cost as much in the Sleep as they did in the Wake; the possibilities were just more vast.”

Though Michael and his friends find the VirtNet to be more interesting than the Wake, they do not mistake this for it being better or more just than the Wake. Here, Michael recognizes the way markets in the VirtNet play upon people’s acquisitiveness to replicate capitalist power structures that exist in the real world—even when practical limitations, like the availability of materials, does not follow them into the Sleep.

“Surprisingly, the majority of people liked their VirtNet self to mirror their real self.”

Though Michael is surprised by the fact that most VirtNet players matched their digital selves to their physical bodies, he seems otherwise unsurprised by examples of the ways in which people’s virtual experiences highly influence their sense of identity—and vice versa. His specific surprise about how bodies may look different form digital selves offers a potential bit of foreshadowing about Michael’s status as a Tangent; he has never had a body, so therefore potentially feels less attached to physical appearance as an indicator of self.

“Kaine didn’t seem as dangerous in the real world—why not, Michael couldn’t say.”

Even after beginning to experience the ways in which Kaine can manipulate the VirtNet beyond the capabilities of any gamer, Michael sees threats in the Sleep as entirely separate from threats in the Wake—or what he perceives to be the Wake. Even as the novel progresses, Michael perceives the dangers of the Sleep personally, not systematically. This uncertainty about why he feels this way suggests that the already blurred line between the two worlds will continue to grow indistinct as the series continues, reflecting The Tensions Between Appearance and Reality.

“Gaming had always been the love of his life, and here he was about to embark on a mission where the stakes couldn’t be any higher. This would truly be the game of games—something the great Gunner Skale might’ve envied. There was a part of him that wondered if one day he’d look back and think he was naive to be so excited. But that part was tiny and easy to shut down.”

As Michael and his friends grow increasingly involved in the hunt for Kaine, they find that the level to which the VirtNet feels like a game decreases. This journey, in which the adolescent characters must embrace the serious repercussions of something that initially seemed like harmless fun, parallels the journey of teenagers into adulthood, invoking coming-of-age elements in the text.

“I don’t know if I can stomach fighting with a knife today, game or no game.”

Bryson’s comment that he doesn’t know if he can bear to fight with a knife that day indicates that he has fought with knives before, an experience that the average teenager is unlikely to have outside of a virtual world. Though Dashner’s novel does not necessarily buy into the cultural argument that video games encourage violent tendencies, it nevertheless indicates that young people are exposed to unusually high levels of violence compared to the real world when they play in virtual realities. This passage therefore speaks to The Mental Repercussions of Virtual Reality.

“They’d all seen plenty of games that weren’t [adults only], and many of those included some truly mentally scarring experiences.”

Before Michael sneaks into Devils of Destruction, he is flippant about The Mental Repercussions of Virtual Reality. Though the tests he faces moving forward encourage him to explore his physical resilience—as Kaine is testing his suitability for the Mortality Doctrine, which will make him, for the first time, a mortal human being who can die—Michael also gradually learns to treat the mental experiences of the VirtNet as meaningful, as well.

“The next morning it all started up again. Kill, kill, get killed. Pain and suffering. Kill some more, get killed some more. For the first time in his life, Michael understood why real soldiers coming back from real wars often had a hard time getting over the things they’d seen and done. And had done to them. If Michael had a soul, it was starting to leak out of his pores.

The one solace he had was that he and his friends were together.”

Michael’s experiences in Devils of Destruction plays into various themes in the novel. His sense that he is losing his soul ties into the novel’s attention to The Mental Repercussions of Virtual Reality: The constant violence might not be real, but the mental violence is real insofar as the teens suffer significant trauma. His understanding of how real soldiers could suffer deleterious mental health effects draws upon technology and The Tensions Between Appearance and Reality, as his virtual experiences offer him empathy for experiences in reality. Finally, his note that his friends offer solace plays into the novel’s attention to the theme of Friendship as an Anchor in Unusual Circumstances.

“Her voice sounded dead. Michael felt just as empty, and he thought he knew why: they’d paid too heavy a price. He knew he’d never be the same.”

As the stakes of traveling along the Path continue, Michael wonders whether or not agreeing to the VNS’ mission against Kaine is worth what it costs him. As the stakes increase, however, he finds himself unable to withdraw from the mission without significant personal cost. This tension between Michael’s choices, stakes, and his later desire to make different choices allows Dashner to build tension in the novel, leaving Michael as an unwitting participant in the overall arc of the series.

“Stuff like this was weird, he thought, but it wasn’t that weird—he’d spent half his life inside the Sleep, and he’d gotten used to strange characters like this appearing. Most of the time they were harmless.”

Michael proves well-versed in the traditional logic of video games; it is when this logic varies that he considers his surroundings to be odd and therefore dangerous. This leaves his understanding of the later challenges on the Path incomplete, as he cannot fathom why mundanity is being coded into Kaine’s virtual world. It is only when he learns, in the final chapter, that he has been tested for worthiness for human life that he understands that he is being taught how to live outside the exciting and action-packed world of video games.

“Even the most brutal games in the VirtNet were played with the knowledge that dying was just a setback. Nothing more than a delay. And that helped people go out there and play without reserve, taking chances and doing things they’d never do in real life. That was what made it fun—you could always go back and try again.”

The impermanence of death is the central factor that determines the role of technology and The Tensions Between Appearance and Reality. Michael notes that unreality is fun—something that increasingly is framed as a contrast to the grinding mundanity of reality, which is often not characterized by action but by inaction. The novel thus emphasizes “real life” as something that is understood in the moments in which nothing happens, rather than incidents of high action.

“It was possibly the most brilliant type of firewall. Not something to kill or maim, but a place to trap you, make you think you were getting somewhere when really you weren’t. Then throw in a creepy ghost that said your name to slowly drive you nuts.”

As Michael and his friends travel along the Path, they note that the challenges they face defy conventional digital-world logic. Michael realizes, however, that this unconventional logic might be brilliant rather than misguided, something that increases Kaine’s status as an antagonist by making him unpredictable but no less competent for that unpredictability.

“Gradually the people they passed soon melded into one mass for him. He no longer distinguished between man and woman, adult and child, fat and thin. It was all just a kaleidoscope of pale skin and staring eyes. He tried not to look at them at all, focusing on the distant point at the far end of the hallway instead.”

Kaine’s challenges expose Michael to the physical realities of being human, but they seek to distance him from the emotional resonances of humanity. In the long hallway, Michael comes to see the many bodies as scenery rather than people, something that both reflects the way humans see Tangents (which Kaine sees as unjust) and the way Kaine, without any apparent sense of the hypocrisy of his stance, sees the human bodies whose brains he “cleans.”

“Michael understood how things worked. When you were in the Sleep, you were always aware on some level that you weren’t in the real world. The worst-case scenario was that you’d die—maybe pretty awfully—then end up back home in your Coffin, where you could get out, take a shower, recover from the ordeal, and go back to play another day. You were always aware of that basic truth.

But on the Path, that awareness felt more distant.”

The more Michael travels the Path, the more fraught The Tensions Between Appearance and Reality become. His growing horror at this inability to distinguish the real from the virtual holds with the novel’s stance that the most frightening thing a person can face is not violence or absurdity, but the truth of one’s own mortality.

“He’d been so scared of what they’d find at the sanctuary, and here they were inside a storybook for little kids. The animals only had to break into song as they worked and it would all be perfect.”

Michael uses knowledge and expectation of genre to render the sight of animals doing human tasks entertaining rather than alarming—though he notices certain features, like geese serving platters of poultry, do not translate into the idyllic expectation he holds of storybook narratives. This scene highlights the extent to which Michael uses expectation to understand his experiences in the digital world. The novel thus frames the VirtNet as a form of genre that follows and subverts its conventions to engage or surprise its players.

“‘Who knows the true definition of real?’ Skale said evenly as he continued to eat. ‘When you’ve been trapped in one place in the Sleep this long, it’s all as real as anything else. Now eat.’”

Skale’s distinction of real and unreal is based in consciousness and experience, rather than embodiment—which is the typical definition that Michael uses. The revelation that Michael is a Tangent offers further significance to Skale’s perspective, even though the legendary player is otherwise framed as a lesser antagonist. Although Skale’s logic has been skewed by his long time living on the Path, he nevertheless aligns with the novel’s clear framing of Michael as real, despite his non-human origins.

“‘I wouldn’t care [how you looked in the Wake]. I swear I wouldn’t. That’s what’s so great about the Sleep. I know who you are inside, and that’s all that matters.’ He’d never said something so cheesy in his life.

‘That’s actually really sweet, Michael.’

He blushed. ‘Plus, I bet you are hot.’”

Michael’s flirtation with Sarah lets him highlight one of the positives of the VirtNet insofar as it allows people to move beyond surface-based assumptions. His assertion that he still believes she is attractive is based not in any real knowledge about her appearance, but in the certainty that his attraction to her personality will extend to her physical appearance. Their bond also highlights Friendship as an Anchor in Unusual Circumstances.

“Slowly, he opened his eyes and saw that there was a red neon sign hanging above a simple wooden door, bathing the door in the light of its bloody letters.

The sign read HALLOWED RAVINE.”

The neon red sign of the Hallowed Ravine parallels the bright red sign announcing Lifeblood Deep that Michael sees outside his window every day. This foreshadows the reveal about Michael’s status as a Tangent and introduces questions to be explored in subsequent installments in the series, such as who was responsible for Michael’s creation and how they are connected to Kaine.

“‘I’ll tell you this—go through that door and your life will never be the same.’

Michael searched for words. ‘Well…couldn’t that be a good thing?’

‘Everything is relative.’ The man didn’t move a muscle as he spoke. ‘A knife is a godsend to the man tied in ropes, death to the man in chains.’

‘Very profound.’ Michael wondered if the guy was a Tangent sent to toy with him.”

Michael’s final challenge along the Path is one to do with curiosity, even when that curiosity is dangerous. This, in the context of the novel, frames suitability for mortality not merely as the ability to survive physical challenges, but the willingness to face physical and emotional danger even knowing that one’s physical form will be at risk.