Wade’s plan, beyond telling his friends how to get the Crystal Key, relies on being arrested by IOI. He ignores messages from Aech, Art3mis, and Shoto, saying, “I saw no reason to tell them what I intended to do” (272).

When the Sixers arrive, Wade engages his security protocols. He has altered his assumed alias’s records to present as unemployed and deeply in debt on his IOI Visa. In preparation for the Sixers getting through his security, Wade wipes his computer’s hard drive and then melts the computer rig. The Sixers arrest Wade, taking him outside in the snow. Crews clean out his apartment, erasing all evidence of his life there. 

As the Sixers transport Wade, he sees “people clustered on every street corner and in every vacant lot, huddled around burning barrels and portable fuel-cell heaters” (276). He reaches 101 IOI Plaza, where he is processed as an “indentured employee.” He and the other indents receive aptitude tests to see how they might be useful to IOI. Wade makes “sure to ace all of the tests on OASIS software, hardware, and networking,” but he intentionally fails the tests that are “designed to gauge [his] knowledge of James Halliday” (278).