Sample Post (From USS Spartan - no longer active)

Ian had been in the holodeck for about an hour. He had been fighting the American Civil War and was close to changing history. He had even gone so far as to record the outcome in case historians would one day want to know how the South should have won.

Ian was in the general's tent looking over the maps of the battlefield. Suddenly, the light began to shift and change. For a moment, Ian didn't think about it until he noticed that it was the lights of the holodeck causing a problem, not the candles that were in the tent illuminating his work space.

Ian didn't think about it considering Engineering had been having several power surges over the past week. Ian continued to look closely at the map until a Lieutenant arrived.

"General," the subordinate said. "We have word that the enemy is upon us."

"How can that be?" Ian said in the accent of a southern general. "My information is only ten minutes old.

"Yes, sir," the lieutenant said. "However, Union soldiers have been spotted entering the camp."

Just then, there was the noise of a pistol being shot. The lieutenant clutched his chest and fell over. Ian went to his side, but it was too late. The lieutenant was dead. "This isn't how it's supposed to happen," he thought to himself.

Another bullet pierced the tent near Ian's head and he quickly ducked under the tent and out the other side. Men were screaming everywhere at the sound of the bullets flying. Confederate troops were trying to load weapons and fight back, but the Union army was too strong. Rather than take prisoners, however, the Union continued to kill every Confederate soldier it saw.

Ian could not believe what was going on. It seemed as if the holodeck program had been re written and the computer was dealing with all of the programming at the same time. Not bothering to sort it out and allow one true winner. The computer was malfunctioning, that was for certain, but what Ian didn't know was if the safety protocols had been removed.

Not willing to take the chance, Ian started to run the other way. The soldiers that had been under Ian's command saw him and shouted for him to return. Ian was no coward by any means. However, under the circumstances, he knew that it would be more prudent to survive his time in the holodeck .

A cannon fired from the distance landed a shell near where Ian had been running and he was knocked to the ground. It took several minutes for him to get up and he was in severe pain. Ian checked his body and discovered that he had shrapnel sticking out of his leg and was bleeding from his head. This confirmed that the safety protocols had been disengaged and Ian knew that he was a sitting duck. If he didn't exit the holodeck, he could be a casualty of a war that was not his own.

Ian crawled and slowly made his way toward the edge of the forest that surrounded the Confederate camp. "Computer, arch!" he yelled. However, the computer did not comply. Ian kept crawling hoping not to be seen by the Union soldiers that were slaughtering every man nearby.

"Computer, arch!" he yelled again. This time, though, a Union soldier heard him and started to run after him. Taking a pistol out, the soldier stopped and took aim at Ian. Ian had made it to the computer console and was in process of stopping the program when he heard the sound of gunpowder being ignited. Ian looked up as the bullet came flying toward him and his hands moved quickly on the control panel and ran an emergency override on the holodeck. The bullet disappeared in the air, but Ian was still in pain. The shrapnel did not disappear, nor did the wound to his head.

"Medical Emergency in Holodeck 1," Ian said, pressing his comm badge. This would take time to heal, but Ian knew that once he was healed, he'd be back in the war again. The war that was not his own and yet everything that made him who he was as a leader and as a person.

Sample (From Richmond Valley RPG)

Taylor was sitting on the floor in her empty room. Boxes surrounded her. She had tears in her eyes. Taylor’s father knocked on the door twice and entered.

“What do you want?” she screamed, throwing her stuffed bear at him. He closed the door quick enough to allow the bear to hit it, and then opened it again.

“The movers need your boxes, honey. It’s time to go.”

After fourteen years in this house, Taylor was leaving. And she was not leaving voluntarily. She wanted to stay in the house. “Her” house. But her father had been offered a job in Washington, in Spokane, as Chief of Staff at a hospital.

Taylor’s father stepped into the room and picked up the bear. “Look, Taylor, this is a great opportunity for me. I’m going to be one of the youngest people in charge of an Emergency Room in the state. That’s big.”

Taylor, still on the floor, still with tears in her eyes, looked up to her father. “What about me? What about my opportunity? I was going to be on Varsity next year! What do you think my chances of being on Varsity at some Podunk school are? None!”

“You don’t know that,” her father interrupted.

“Yeah, well neither do you!”

Taylor’s father handed the bear back to her and she grabbed it from his hands. She slammed it hard onto one of the open boxes and placed her head on her hands, sulking. Her father stepped into the hallway and called downstairs. “Okay, you can get these boxes now.”

Taylor sat in the room and didn’t move while the men came and went carrying her life out the door. She watched, but said nothing. Tears flowed steadily from her eyes and she wiped them often to not allow the movers to see how many tears they were causing her.

When the last box was gone, she wiped her eyes one last time. She noticed that her stuffed bear had fallen from its box and was lying on the floor. She placed the bear so that it was sitting upright, stood up herself, took her purse from the floor and left the room, with the bear staring at her as she closed the door.

Taylor walked downstairs and looked at her father standing at the car. She exited the house, closing the door behind her. She got into the car without a word and her father got in as well. He started the car and the two drove off, on their way to a new life in Richmond Valley