It was a quiet suburban street

Well maintained houses and nearly trimmed gardens

Folks were leaving for work

Susan said goodbye as her husband left for the office

She worked from home doing IT assignments

Preferring those stand alone work packages

Which can be done without people interactions

She worked late at night leaving her daytimes free

Susan was still in her pajamas when she put on the VR headset

A few moments later she was in a remote Scottish castle

Moving from room to room looking for other characters

She found her gaming friend John in the dining room

Hey I missed you he said giving her a virtual kiss

There were no other characters in the castle today

What would you like to do today asked John

Lets have a big feast with music and dancing

With a few commands on their keyboards they added more characters

Servers filled the table with delicious food

A piper played highland music

Traditional Scottish dancers twirled around

Susan sat next to John at the head of the table

They were King and Queen for the day

Everybody was happy and having fun

Suddenly there was screaming

English Redcoat soldiers burst in and mayhem erupted

Swords and daggers flashed in hand to hand combat

John picked up a sword to protect Susan

He ran the sword through an approaching Redcoat

Susan watched in horror as blood sprayed from a gaping wound

She was terrified even in this virtual world

Somebody had hacked into their game and was taking control

She turned to John just as he was stabbed in the heart

The Redcoats ran away as she tried to tend to John

He looked at her with sad eyes and said “I love you Susan”

When John slipped away she could not bear it any longer

She ripped off the VR headset and was plunged back into the reality of her home office

It was such a relief to escape the horrors of what she just witnessed

Catching her breath as she went to the kitchen for a glass of water

As she filled the glass she noticed the blood on her hands and all over her pajamas