The sound of giddy children and various beeping machines kept most of the arcade in a constant state of commotion, and the sounds were only part of the rambunctious equation. The flashing lights of many different colors shooting off of every available piece of furniture and machine alike made an avalanche of disco balls look tame by comparison, and the scent of many different types of food, most of them unhealthy enough to make your arteries explode without the latest high tech health care available to take care of you, wafted their way through the building through the large open doorway leading to the food bar, most likely intentionally left that way to draw in hungry children who had just spent hours drawn to the pretty lights of the arcade like moths to a flame. It was a sensory overload that would destroy anyone's unprepared nervous system, but it seemed to attract a whole lot of attention from all over town as the go to arcade to spend the afternoon at. Indeed, the Starlight Cafe and Arcade found in the small town of Freebird Ohio had made quite a name for itself among it's citizens. It wasn't the prettiest to look at from the outside with all the hastily done renovations to expand some sections of the arcade, but it got the job done.

A 5'6'' albino boy, kneeling down in a blue and white uniform, smiled politely upwards as a couple seemingly too old for arcade games passed by him for the exit. He didn't judge them for it, however. For the conceivable future he'd probably be spending the rest of his life playing games as well. Might as well. Not like the real world outside the arcade had too much to offer anyways.

"Have a nice day," he called out to them, continuing to clean up the mess that some thoughtless little kids had made with their food and drinks while playing around in one of the arcade machines. It made the bottoms of his white sneakers wet and sticky. He hated that feeling. Gave him the shivers. Luckily he was still able to concentrate enough to power through it, probably because he knew that he only had four more minutes left of his shift that ended at 2:00 pm. Even for only part time work it still left him drained. He wasn't cut out for work, but as far as work went he didn't mind this too much. At the very least it gave him easy access to the hit virtual reality space combat game called Ultimate Horizons.

"Hey, hey, are you a boy or a girl," a little kid questioned lightly from behind, tugging on the back of his shirt.

Little brat. He let out a sigh. Only two minutes left. He can make it.

"I'm a boy, of course," he replied, turning around. Sure, perhaps his "slightly needing a good haircut pretty soon" hairstyle could possibly be mistaken for a girl's from behind, but his face...was actually kind of soft as well. Oh well. He just wouldn't let that bother him. What do they know anyways? He bent down again to finish wiping up the mess.

"Pay up, Jimmy," the other boy nearby, probably his friend, remarked while holding out his hand.

"Ah man," the first boy said, slugging a shiny golden arcade coin at him. It clattered to the ground and the boy scooped it up soon after, pocketing it with a smirk.

William sighed again, taking one last look at his clock. Finished just in time! His face brightened, if only by a little. He expertly weaved through the crowded arcade to the back room, punched out of his shift, said his goodbyes to a few of the co-workers he ran into, then headed up the stairs to another section of the arcade that had all of the more expensive arcade machines for the 16 or over crowd. Nobody really enforced that rule unless someone threw a fuss. It was certainly less chaotic without the little rampaging monsters running around, and at least in his opinion a lot more pleasant because of it. In the right corner of the arcade was his destination. It was a rather large room lined with devices that looked like slender cockpits wrapping around the entire wall. If the windshields were raised then that meant they were open, but unfortunately for him all 40 were occupied at the moment. It was a tad earlier then normal for this to occur. Some of them would probably be getting off soon, but he couldn't afford to wait. He needed to get online right now due to accepting a challenge by TrollerCat57 to a battle to the death after he insulted William's choice of command ship, calling it the Noob Flier and how it could never be any good. William was so going to destroy him with it too...

Then he remembered something, his eyes catching sight of the one cockpit situated off to the side, spare parts scattered around it and the windshield lifted off, propped up against the wall. That function and a few others didn't work, but as far as he knew the device itself was still operational. Yes! He still had a chance to get online in time to not be late for the challenge! But would he actually use a machine without the windshield? During the time playing the game one's senses are transferred into it, making their body in the real world completely prone and defenseless, ripe to be stolen from should the criminals block the view of the cameras during that instant. However, this area was for the more civilized crowd, after all. Could he trust them? Ah, what's the worst that could happen. He had a date to uphold. He hoped into the device, inserting a plastic memory card into a middle panel. While the game was loading up he slipped off his sticky socks and shoes, setting them off to the side for now. If people wanted to steal those then that would be their problem just as much as it would be his. He them placed the helmet onto his head, causing the outside world to disappear from him completely. However, his motor control functions still remained in his body for now.

"Memory loaded. Please grip the handles with both hands to transfer into the game," a voice instructed. He did so, and after a brief second of what felt like someone pulling on his entire body, or perhaps his spirit itself, he found himself staring out into the darkness of space from within his command ship, sitting in the command chair found just behind the pilot seat. He was wearing a light blue bodysuit and helmet that looked like a much less bulky version of what astronauts would wear. He got up onto his feet, stretching his digital body, even after all this time wondering how it feels so real, as if this could very well be his real existence and his life back on Earth was the boring minigame. He didn't have time to dawdle in amazement, however. He slipped into the pilot's chair, causing a holographic popup to appear in his vision. He swiped at the options a bit and the stars elongated into beams of light as his ship jolted forward, warping off through the galaxy to location a-3b12 at a breakneck pace completely impossible outside of a videogame. Perhaps it was moments like this that did prove it was still just a game.

The stars went back to normal, his warp interrupted by the presence of his target, TrollerCat57, occupying a command ship dead ahead. Otherwise the area was empty, at least for now. Perfect. William didn't expect to be able to beat his opponent in a fair fight, but he planned for this battle all day. He would do as much damage as possible the conventional way before sending his command ship on a suicide dive into the enemy's. After all, he didn't say how he would use his command ship to win the fight. After that he could escape using his fighter in the docking bay and perhaps take his opponent down while he was still reeling from the impact. Finally, someone would take him seriously after this. William let out a smirk from underneath his helmet as he pressed forward on the control stick, accelerating into attack speed.

If only other ships didn't fly in to interrupt him then he had the upmost faith that he'd be coming out of this battle victorious and with the resources taken from his destroyed enemy's command ship. His comeback tour begins now!

"Awesome, thanks!" Julia said, giving a small salute to the bored looking man behind the counter of the frozen yogurt shop as she walked out, cone in hand. If she didn't get this job, at least she still had the free cone today. She zipped up her jacket to protect her from the chill wind, stuck her hands in her pocket and continued down the street and past the crowds of kids wandering town now that school was out. She passed pizza parlors and candy shops and her stomach grumbled. If only she had money for a quick bite on the way home, but she needed to hold onto what little she did have for the Duelist's next adventure.

"Hey, Jules!" someone called out behind her. She turned around to see a boy around her age was jogging down the street and stopped a little bit away from her. "Hey, wassup?" He asked and blew his wild brown hair out of the way.

"Hey Pete," Julia said, turning around and continuing. Pete moved beside her and walked in step. "It's good, just heading down to the arcade before I head home," she shrugged.

"Cool, I was gonna head down there myself. You played Ultimate Horizon yet, or are you still playing that stupid Deep Dark Dungeons thing?" he asked. Julia twitched.

"It's not stupid, you just aren't any good at it. Just wailing on everything with an axe won't solve every fight. It takes skill," she replied. "It's all about timing, dodge, block, counter. Use your enemies weaknesses to your advantage. Don't just swing wildly, Mr. Barbarian." She gave Pete a pointed look. She'd reached the top of the cone and ate the edges to get the ice cream inside.

"Hey, I wasn't even playing a barbarian."

"That doesn't help your case."

Pete harrumphed and Julia chuckled. They approached the arcade, which to be honest looked pretty ugly from the outside. The pair entered, mentally preparing themselves for the barrage of lights and colors that awaited them inside. The place smelt like a combination of pizza crusts, sugar, and sweat. The pair immediately made their way upstairs where they kept all the VR gear and Julia leaned against the railing behind all the VR machines, watching the people inside the cockpits play whatever games they were playing. Mostly Ultimate Horizon, as usual, but a few were playing Deep Dark Dungeons and another game she wasn't familiar with. On one players screen, a heavily armored warrior held a massive shield in front of him as a demonic creature wailed away at him while right next to it a pilot did dizzying stunts as he avoided laser fire from all directions. Julia felt a hand in her pocket and she turned around, about to lash out but it was just Pete standing there.

"It's on me," he grinned. Julia raised and eyebrow and dug into her pocket, pulling out a handful of bills. Just enough for an hour of gameplay.

"You know, you did owe me from that time you forgot your lunch money." Julia smiled and punched him in the shoulder before scanning the room. A few machines we open and she slid into ones, making sure to untie and remove her boots before she lied down. Pete grabbed the machine next to her and did the same.

"But, you gotta try Ultimate Horizon this time," he said right before the cockpit closed down on him. Julia rolled her eyes before the cockpit closed and slid her card into the slot before she grabbed onto the handles, entering the virtual world.

---

The Ultimate Horizons title spread out before her on a screen and she found herself sitting in a lobby of sorts, complete with couch and a futuristic looking coffee table. Signs pointed her too a door at the far end of the room, so she followed and began the character set up process. A list of possible jobs presented themselves to her and she scrolled through them. A soft pinging sound seemed to come from everywhere, signaling that another player was trying to contact her. Pete, of course. She patched him in and his face filled a small box in her vision. She dismissed it so it was just audio.

"I see you're in 'Lazarus'. Where you at?" he asked. The sounds of a ship's engine warming up came from his end of the call.

"I'm still picking a job." she said. Miner, Smuggler, Pirate, Bounty Hunter, Marine... She stopped. Marine could be fun. She read the description. Specialized in ship-board combat, though could still fly a fighter. She selected it and her avatar was soon decorated with a military-esque uniform with armor plating. A faint shimmering appeared in front of her and the game notified her that a selection of weapons and a suit of armor was added to her ship storage along with the normal starting gear. Another door opened up ahead, prompting her to continue to the hanger. She did. On the otherside of the door sat a sleek, aerodynamic looking jet. "So this is my starter ship? Nice." She said, approaching it.

"Get in and I'll teach you the ropes. Just follow the tutorial and meet me outside."

---

Julia was floating lazily through space behind a larger gunship outfitted with swiveling turrets looking in all directions. She checked her ships inventory and looked at her selection of weapons.

"Here, I'm gonna jump and you should automatically follow me. I've got a place where we can do some practice, I'll even grab one of my old fighters. and we can have a dog fight."

Julia just nodded and kept looking, barely noticing when her ship entered FTL and popped out in an empty (well, emptier than usual) stretch of space. Two large ships were floating opposite to each other and Julia looked out the cockpit of her ship curiously.

"Thought you said that no one would be here," she said.

Pete shrugged. "So did I. You know, I bet they're gonna fight. Those are both command ships, they're not the biggest in the game but they're way bigger than ours. They've got hangers and stuff in them so you can move a bunch of ships around. Must be two clans about to fight. Or they're just talking, but I doubt that. Let's sit back and watch, eh?"

Ven had been helping her father with the business. She was working longer that normal, in hopes her father would pay her the equivalent of over-time. She needed money, after buying her very own Ultimate Horizon system, she only had a dollar and some change, and from what she saw in the ingame market, that would get her no where. After she took a bath to relax, she got dressed into something more casual and got into the cockpit shaped machine. She had played a few times, and was still trying to get used to the game. She was primarily a bomber pilot, but somehow she qualified as a technician if needed. Ven didn't really understand how that worked, but didn't really bother to ask around.

Once inside the game, she found herself in an empty patch of space. With an audible sigh she looked down at the controls. "Too bad this baby doesn't have a cloak or something." She brought up the HUD and swiped through some screens till she ended up on the clan screen. Her application was still pending. "Either he hasn't decided yet, or no longer gets on" she sighed at the thought of the latter. "Why would someone create a clan, only to not get on anymore?" She then sat there for a few minutes before deciding to go somewhere. Hopefully to just watch something, anything.

After the FTL drive had jumped her through, she stared blankly for a few minutes before realizing what was in front of her. Two command ships. Not the biggest ones she's seen, but still bigger than her small bomber. She couldn't see them physically, but her sensors showed two fighter craft exactly across from her, on the other side of the confrontation. She had a feeling she stumbled into something she shouldn't have. Two command ships and two fighters against one lonely bomber, this would not end well if they decided to engage her.

Taylor Giles RP Post

---

Colorful assortments of clothing lay in heaps atop a wooden display table. Pale hands quickly fold and organize the mess. A smile spreads across a teenage girl’s face as she looks toward a digital clock hung on the wall. There are five minutes left until this shift ends, also marking the beginning of her weekend. Brown eyes are locked in place, watching numbers go up in value. Finally, the clock shifts to a new hour. Her heart beat quickens, she saved up enough money to go to the arcade this weekend and play Ultimate Horizon. Turning on the balls of her feet, she heads to the employees’ break room more excited than usual to clock out. She treks down store halls until a tall wooden door stands in front of her marked “H.R.” Men and women stand around, leaning on cubicles drinking coffee. There is a kiosk in the corner of this room. She hurries past her work associates while saying bye. Unclipping her I.D. card from a lanyard, the girl swipes it through a slot in the machine to clock out.

She grabs her light brown canvas purse from a cubby before heading out. For a weekend, the streets aren't busy. Luckily, the arcade is a block away, so she doesn't have to walk far. A few minutes before 2:30 P.M., she reaches the arcade. The colorful display of lights makes her regret leaving a pair of sunglasses at home. Stepping inside, the smell of overpriced food clogs her senses. Scrunching her nose up, she searches the building for a virtual reality section. Younger kids are running around this area. Perhaps it’s upstairs, the arcade she frequents has more expensive equipment stored away from children. Her pale lime colored skirt swooshes around her legs as she rushes upstairs. To the right, V.R. machines line the wall. Brown eyes scan the space, but all of the game pods are occupied. Pouting, she walks toward a sitting area running across the wall. Several uneventful minutes pass before a windshield pops up. An older man gets out of the machine.

He blinks for a moment before looking toward her, “Do you want to play Ultimate Horizon? I just got off. It’s a pretty fun game if you haven’t tried it.”

She straightens her back before looking up with a smile, “Oh, thanks! I’m really excited to play.”

“Have fun,” he waves at her while walking off.

Pressing her lips together, she rushes over to the machine. Her brother already has a day of progress over her! She pulls out her credit card and slips it into the machine. For a moment, a grim look etches itself onto her face. This will take up most of her paycheck, and she doesn’t want to work more hours! Besides, she doesn’t like her job in the first place; it’s just a way to get money. However, she can’t let her brother break their current tie. Thus far, neither of them has beaten the other’s stats in an R.P.G. Sighing, she slides onto the seat and takes off her purse before slipping the game helmet over her head. Everything goes black.

“New game data loaded, please grip the handles with both hands to transfer into the game,” a mechanical voice instructs.

The girl jumps up, somewhat startled before doing as told. For a moment, it feels as though she’s being ripped from her body. Light seeps in through her eyelids. She was in an arcade one moment ago (technically, she supposes she still is); Virtual reality never ceases to amaze. She is inside a cozy, but futuristic lobby; arrows point down the hall to a character set up room. A screen pops up in front of her asking for her real name, and an in-game one. The first slot is easy to fill in.

“Taylor Giles,” she says, the game picks up her voice and fills her name in. Knitting her brows together, Taylor ponders username options.

After several agonizing moments, she looks toward the screen, “Jellyfish of Death.”

Surprisingly, the name is available. Next, she scrolls through a list of job options and picks Command Ship Driver.

“Are you sure you want that job to start off? Low level Command Ship Drivers can only join teams with members who are two levels ahead of themselves to prevent power leveling,” a mechanical voice asks.

“Well, you have to start somewhere,” she murmurs.

“Please wait while Ultimate Horizon loads a list of possible teams. You will be transported to the nearest space station.”

Taylor yelps as her body begins to dissolve into air. Once again, everything turns black. Her faculties return, and she looks around. White walls surround her, with transparent black beams running along them. Four other players are standing in the area. They’re wearing colorful spacesuits very different from her outfit. The group has sleek but heavily accessorized armor. She decides they must be higher levels than her.

“Hello, and welcome to Space Station AN-12. This room is reserved for crew-less command ship drivers. There are screens to your left, please go to one and scroll through your team options. Crews reserve the right to reject you,” a clinical voice instructs from above.

A square is situated in the middle of the black screen, asking for people to place their index fingers onto it. Taylor presses her finger against the screen and it lights up four times before changing into an option page. Charts lay in front of her detailing team stats. Most of the teams are made up of level three players. Looking to her side, she notices the man beside her is looking at a different batch of teams. All of his team mate options seem to be in the level forty ranges. Shifting her attention back to the selection screen, Taylor attempts to join a team.

“Thank you for putting in a request, your response is still pending,” a mechanical voice says.

Several second pass before a window pops up. The corners of her lips tug down into a frown. “Rejected,” that’s all it says. She tries to join several other teams, but groans out in frustration when they all reject her.

“Huh?” She stares at the last team chart. Why is there only one person? His name is… William. Well, he doesn’t seem to care about screen names.

Hmm, this might be a good opportunity, she thinks. It’ll give her the chance to pick team mates! Grinning, she taps her finger against the “Join” button and waits for a response. They better not reject her!

William was slightly annoyed by the random appearance of other fighters just as he was about to engage his bitter rival. Luckily they weren't in command ships or else he'd be in even more trouble. Were they TrollerCat57's lackeys who were dishonorably called upon despite this supposed to be a one on one duel? Oddly enough they held back, so perhaps they just so happened to stumble upon this area of space by bad luck. Hmm...it would probably be best to just ignore them and hope that this theory was correct. If not then he'd be destroyed well before he was able to get TrollerCat57's shields down enough to finish him with a suicide attack.

"Alright, time to eat space dust!" He shouted, moving in close to the other large grey ship and opening fire with his forward facing rapid fire laser turrets. Explosions rocketed against the flat surface of it's topside, revealing it's blue shields flickering into existence as they absorbed the damage. The first blow was his and the enemy ship was in a bad position to counterattack. This was going far better then expected...almost too good. He pushed his luck and kept diving in to fire as long as possible into his shields, but as he drew closer the four turrets on the ship's sides suddenly came to life and delivered a powerful barrage of fire into his windshield all at once. He flinched as colors exploded across his field of view and the ship rocked around violently, throwing him from his chair. The enemy command ship was filled to the brim with other players! William gritted his teeth in frustration. He knew he shouldn't have trusted a guy with troll and cat in his name. He managed to climb back into his sheet and jerk up on the joystick just in time to snap upwards and avoid a collision that would have destroyed his ship against the other one. Alarms and flashing red lights alerted him of his shields reaching below 50% strength as he zoomed away from the range of the turrets as quickly as possible as they managed to get in a few more shots into his backside. The enemy began to turn around to follow him and two fighters launched out of one of it's hangers. That meant that at least seven enemy players were involved in this battle and things were not looking good for him at all. Should he end the conflict by escaping to a safe location? Should he fight to the death? His enemy did take moderate damage, so if he could just manage one more good attack run. How could he do that by himself?

Suddenly another alert came up in his menu besides the warnings. Someone wanted to join his clan? One of the nearby ships? Jellyfish of Death was this person's name. Odd, but that's beside the point. The point was that this person might just be what he was looking for if he was to win. The enemy already cheated, so why couldn't he? He stopped controlling his ship, hoping that the enemy couldn't catch up to him and nail him while he was simply flying straight. While this was going on he hit the accept button for that join request and then scanned all nearby ships, sending them offers to join his clan as well. If they all joined then they'd have the enemy fighters outnumbered. The command ship full of turrets would be the real hassle, but if the fighters could be taken out then they just might be able to pull something out.

Julia watched the ensuing battle in interest.

"Ouch, this guy is done for," Pete said, watching as one of the ships opened up on the side, releasing a pair of fighters.

"Jeez, should we help the poor guy out?" Julia asked. Pete shrugged in his ship.

"I say let him get blown up. He should've known not to mess with a guy like that in his s***** starter ship," he replied the game automatically bleeping out the offending word. They watched the fight continue, before an alert suddenly popped up on Julia's ship.

William has invited you to join his clan!
[Accept] [Decline]

Julia looked at the floating dialogue box on her ship's dashboard curiously before pressing [Decline] with her finger, then set her eyes on the fighters circling the command ship. "I think this guy needs the help, I'm going in." She said, pulling back a lever on the control panel. Her ship blasted forwards towards the losing ship that she presumed belong to this "William" fellow and turned up sharply, towards one of the fighters from the other ship, letting loose a barrage of laser fire in their direction. She hailed William.

"Hey, they call me Lazarus. Ready to make these losers bleed?" She said, putting on her famous maniac grin.

Ven was taken aback. Such a sudden move. But when she looked closely, the attacking ship didn't seem buckle under the attack. She could only guess the captain of the other ship was cool-headed. After a few more seconds, another move, this time from the other ship, shocked Ven. It's turrets began firing.

She lifted a hand and pointed at William's ship, and began talking to herself "He must be piloting alone, and that one" she pointed at the other one "must have a crew aboard..." then fighters launched "..with fighter cover. At least they aren't heading for me." She sat back, watching how William's attack was foiled, and how he retreated. Then a beeping alert appeared on her HUD.

William has invited to join his clan
{Accept} {Decline}

"Must want help after that plan failed." She reached her finger up and slid the notification to the side "I'll get to you in a second". She powered up the engines and prepped the weapons. "Now lets see how fast this thing is in combat." She throttled it and faked heading towards William's ship.

Once she was close enough, she slid the notification back and tapped accept. This would not give the enemy much time to react to a new contact. She aimed the bomber down and launched a whole salvo at the other command ship before rocketing away from it, towards and past William's ship. Hailing him as she did so "Hay there, you can call me Ven." A hail of weapons fire was aimed at her. They apparently didn't like dirty moves pulled on them.