At the start of the movie, a bunch of teens have  gathered up to participate in a gaming tournament,  

where the winner takes 10 Grand. The only  objective of the game is to kill the other  

players and get as many points as you can. After  the game begins, two players start slaughtering  

all the other players one by one, hence racking up  a lot of points. One of them is an aspiring newbie  

girl while the other one is a pro, who has won  several accolades in the world of gaming. As the  

crowd cheers on, the veteran uses his experience  and takes the lead, but the newbie girl still has  

an ace up her sleeve. She whips out a bottle of  energy drink called the ‘Impulse 9’ and drinks  

it in one go, which not only gives her energy,  but also slows down the time by 100 times. With  

this power, she kills all the players on sight,  including the veteran guy. The girl eventually  

wins the tournament, and begins celebrating with  her boyfriend. But little did she know that her  

excitement is about to be cut off in the most  brutal way possible. The energy drink’s bottle  

falls to the ground and shatters, causing the  girl to snap back to reality. And when she does,  

she finds herself as an adult with  three children. To make matters worse,  

she is living in a dilapidated house with no  electricity and modern equipment. Outside,  

the world has turned into a barren wasteland, and  even the oxygen has become poisonous to breathe.

Following this, we rewind to a few days before  the tournament took place with the introduction  

of the girl; Val Hernandez. She is a brash  up-and-coming FPS gamer whose only dream in life  

is to go professional and make a living out of it.  The year is 2017 and Val lives with her divorced  

father Carlos. One day, he sets up Val for a  job interview at a diner, and she reluctantly  

leaves the house in formals. Outside, her  boyfriend Evan comes to pick her up in his car.

After they leave, Val quickly changes her dress  in the back. It turns out that she is ditching  

her interview and going to a tournament of a game  called Field of Fire. Just like most of the FPS  

battle royale games out there, Field of Fire is a  multiplayer game, where the main objective is to  

be the last person standing. Val figures that  if she wins first place, she could make a ton  

of money and build herself a gaming computer.  However, Evan pops her bubble by revealing that  

a seasoned professional gamer named Roy is going  to make a surprise appearance in the tournament.

Soon, the two arrive at the arena for the  competition and see Roy taking pictures with  

his fans. Before the first match commences, Evan  reminds his girlfriend that she should not get  

carried away and just focus on qualifying for  the finals. However, Val has her sights set on  

beating the arrogant Roy. After a while, all the  players get seated on their computers and the game  

starts. Val takes an early lead but Roy catches up  to her without breaking a sweat. He even interacts  

with the crowd in the middle of the game, such  is his confidence. Taking advantage of this,  

Val racks some points, and is on the verge  of winning but instead of finishing the game,  

she decides to go for a glory kill. The  plan quickly backfires, and Roy eliminates  

her in the blink of an eye. Despite this, Val  qualifies for the finals happening the next day.

As the couple leaves the arena, Roy comes  out and mocks Val before proceeding to  

take selfies with his fans. And while Evan is  away to get his car, a man named Kojima comes  

up to Val and reveals that he knows the secret to  winning. Val is perplexed by the strange comment,  

but before she can say anything, Kojima  hands her his business card and leaves.

When Val reaches home, she  tries her best to not make  

any noise but is caught red handed  by her father. Left with no choice,  

she tells him the truth about where she was  during the day which infuriates Carlos even  

more. He then orders her to go to the diner  the next day and beg for a job interview.

However, Val asserts that the tournament final  also takes place the next day, which is more  

important for her future. And just like any other  parent, Carlos tries to make her understand that  

online gaming has no future, but the stubborn  Val ignores him and storms off to her room.

Shortly after, she watches a podcast about  the game earlier in the day and gets angry  

that Roy took the first position. Just then, she  notices Kojima’s business card and remembers him  

talking about the secret to winning. Hence,  fueled with vengeance and the desire to win,  

she decides to visit the given address. Soon,  she reaches ‘The Golden Saucer ', which turns  

out to be a gaming cafe. Inside, a couple  of people are playing video games on their  

computers and consoles. Soon, Kojima  approaches her and instructs her to sit  

down and play a game. Val is still confused  as to why Kojima had given her the business  

card but nonetheless she gives the game a  shot. She cranks up the game to the highest  

difficulty and has trouble completing the  level. Seeing this, Kojima hands her an  

energy drink called Impulse 9. However he tells  her that it is not an ordinary energy drink.

Curious, Val takes a small sip of  the drink. And all of a sudden,  

everything that she perceives starts  to move in slow motion. As a result,  

the game, which was impossible to play a while  ago, has now become extremely easy for her.

Suddenly at the blink of an eye, Val wakes up  and finds herself sitting across the table from  

Kojima. When she inquires as to what happened,  he explains that Impulse 9 stretches time for  

whoever drinks it and that it has been an hour  since Val had sipped the drink. He also reveals  

that the amount of time stretched depends on  the quantity of intake of the energy drink.

Following this, Kojima demands 500 dollars  for one bottle which shocks Val. She starts  

thinking that using the drink to compete in  tournaments might be cheating. But just then,  

Kojima gets a call from Roy and it's  revealed that he also uses Impulse 9  

to win games. This is why he has been labeled  ‘unbeatable’ by other fellow gamers and pundits.  

After learning of this, Val eventually  decides to buy the bottle of Impulse 9.

The next day, at the arena, Val takes out the  bottle of Impulse 9 and puts it by her keyboard.  

Just before the game starts, she takes a small  sip of the energy drink. Then, using the ultra  

slow motion, she dominates the leaderboard for a  while. Seeing this, Roy also drinks some Impulse  

9 and starts climbing the ranks, ultimately  reaching the top. This makes Val desperate,  

so she chugs the entire bottle of the energy drink  regardless of the outcome. As a result, time for  

Val moves at an extremely slower pace, and she  uses that to her full advantage. Eventually, she  

kills Roy's avatar and wins the whole tournament.  The crowd goes wild and everyone cheers for her as  

well as Evan. As the couple kisses, the energy  bottle falls to the ground and shatters. All  

of a sudden, Val snaps back to reality and finds  herself sitting on a chair in a dilapidated house.

She is holding a baby and shortly after, Evan  comes into the room wearing torn and filthy  

clothes. He puts the baby to sleep and tells Val  to get ready. Val is super confused and starts  

to hyperventilate after seeing her fully grown  adult body and a wedding ring on her hand. She  

runs downstairs for some respite, but to her  horror, two other children call her mommy.

Suddenly, Val throws up in shock and  runs outside the house. She finds the  

neighborhood in total disarray as people live  in tents with public bathrooms out in the open.

Here, It's finally revealed that Val has  traveled to the year 2029 having skipped  

over 10 years of her life in an instant.  Furthermore, the town where they live is  

enclosed by large walls which separates it from  the wasteland that surrounds it. In the wasteland,  

dangerous creatures the Death Lizards  reside, that are notorious for attacking  

humans. Because of this, the residents of  the town guard the gate regularly in shifts.

Moreover, it turns out that the people who  had drunk a large quantity of Impulse 9 in  

the past are only waking up now and are  called pulsers. This resulted in people  

snapping back to reality many years into  the future with no memories whatsoever,  

causing havoc and chaos all over the world.  However, there is no accurate way of knowing  

if one is a pulser until and unless they snap  back to the current time. Furthermore, since the  

apocalypse was caused by the pulsers, most people  despise them and rarely allow them to stay inside  

the safety of the walls. It turns out the town’s  sheriff and Deputy are Val and a man named Dan.  

To avoid ending up like the pulser, Val hides  the fact that she too had consumed Impulse 9.

Later at home, Val tries to work out what  is happening. She then recalls her father,  

Carlos and attempts to recall her last meeting  with him. However, when she turns her head,  

Val notices an Urn with her father’s ashes  on the mantle. This devastates her and she  

starts crying profusely. Shortly after,  Deputy Dan calls Val down for ‘latrine  

duty’. She initially declines but Dan reminds  her that she is a sanitation commissioner and  

has to do the work. As a result, she is forced  to clean the dirty latrines for several hours.

Many days pass and Val starts  getting accustomed to the ways  

of the apocalyptic neighborhood. One day, she  does every single task including guard duty,  

scavenging and latrine duty. She picks up the  kids from school where her daughter; Sophia,  

gives her a drawing of her, saying that she is her  hero. However, Val is extremely exhausted and she  

doesn't appreciate the little girl’s efforts.  Once she reaches the house, she finds Evan  

pedaling a bicycle to power up a game console as  electricity is not available. To Val's surprise,  

the game is actually her favorite game; Field of  Fire. Val is overly excited by this and agrees to  

play one round before putting the kids to sleep.  After Evan heads out to a social gathering,  

Val and the kids start to game into the night.  Hours pass by and suddenly, Evan rushes inside.  

It's clear that he is terrified and informs  Val that she has missed her guard duty shift.  

As a result, Dan, who was thumping on the gate  to be let in, was killed by the death lizards.

Wasting no time, the two rush to the scene  where Dan's traumatized wife is furious with  

Val. Filled with guilt, Val tries to go home  but Evan says that she still has to finish  

her guard shift. Reluctantly, she obliges.  After her shift ends, Val returns home with  

agonizing pain. She expresses her feelings  towards Evan, who comforts and reassures her  

before going to bed. Thinking she has no place  in the new world, Val decides to leave everything  

behind and to travel the wastelands.  As a result, she writes Evan a letter,  

admitting that she is actually a pulser. The  next morning, Val exits her neighborhood with  

the intention of never coming back while Evan  reads the letter and is in complete disbelief.

In the next scene, Val continues to walk the  barren land and soon comes across an abandoned  

building. It turns out that the dilapidated  building is actually Kojima's cafe; The Golden  

Saucer. Val hesitantly enters the gaming cafe  and looks around for a bit. To her surprise,  

Kojima pops out of the counter,  however she feels as if something  

is off. She realizes that Kojima hasn't  aged a day but he doesn't explain how.

As the two chat, Kojima finds out that  Val had just snapped back a week ago and  

he admits that a lot of lives were ruined  because of the Impulse 9 drink. However,  

he has a plan to rid her of all the sufferings  she has been facing as of late. Kojima brings  

out a large bottle of Impulse 9 and tells her  to drink it, and if she does, she will never  

snap back into this world. This is because she  will travel hundreds of years in the future,  

and by that time, she will already be dead.  Kojima also suggests she play her favorite  

game while going through with it. Val likes the  idea and decides to sit down to play Field of  

Fire. But when she leans forward to grab the  Impulse 9 bottle, she finds the drawing that  

her daughter made for her and becomes emotional.  Val then takes a trip down the memory lane and  

remembers all the good moments she had with her  children and Evan. As a result, she abolishes her  

plan to consume the energy drink and instead heads  back to the community to reunite with her family.

At the gate, an angry Evan is on guard duty  and he refuses to let his wife in as she  

betrayed everyone's trust. Val apologizes for  everything and promises to start over and make  

things right. All of a sudden, the two of them  hear gunshots from afar and realize that it is  

the death lizards approaching their community.  It's then revealed that the death lizards are  

a group of normal people who are cannibals  and hunt on others in the wasteland. So,  

Evan lets Val in and the alarms go off,  sending everyone into a state of panic.

One woman tells Val that everyone is going to  the ravine as no one is ready enough to fend  

off the attackers. Hearing this, an idea  strikes her mind. Since everyone in the  

community feels betrayed by her, she plans to  gain their trust. Hence, she tells her husband  

that she will be staying back and holding  off the intruders for as long as she can.  

Evan is sad to leave without her, but when Val  tells him to go for their children, he obliges.

Shortly after, Val whips out the large Impulse 9  bottle from earlier and gets ready for battle. The  

death lizards also make their way through the  gate, ready to wreak havoc. It's then revealed  

that the leader of the death lizards is none  other than Roy himself. The two immediately  

recognize each other and Roy reveals that he  snapped back into reality a few years back,  

and now, he has become a barbaric leader, who can  kill anyone he wants. But despite his threats,  

Val is not unphased. It turns out that she  has already downed the energy drink before  

they arrived, which becomes evident when  she tosses the empty bottle towards Roy.

Suddenly, Val goes into slow motion and  opens fire on one of the gas canisters,  

sending the attackers flying. A brutal  shootout ensues and Val manages to take  

out almost all of them. Unfortunately, she gets  shot in the stomach and shoulder before falling  

to the ground. All of a sudden, Roy comes  out and he fires a shot at Val but misses.  

Taking advantage of the opportunity, she  shoots back and successfully kills Roy.

Following this, she fires off a flare with her  last breath, signaling to Evan that the community  

has been saved. The movie ends as Evan notices  the bright red flare while Val slowly dies.