You’re a tall, thin girl.

(Important note: Going onward from this chapter, male/female situations are determined via a condition variable set by this chapter. If you are not playing in Game Mode, future chapters will still consider you male. I apologize for this, but it looks like it’s unavoidable using the CHYOA platform.)

You see a relatively tall, awkward girl looking back at you. You have long, wavy, unkempt tresses of thick, black hair, and thicker glasses which make your hazel eyes look unnaturally small. You've suffered from pretty severe myopia your entire life, which hasn't exactly helped you out when it comes to social graces. A lifetime of bullying has made you painfully shy, perpetually anxious, and extremely defensive. You're basically wary of almost anyone your age, expecting them to judge you, hurt you, even before they've even met you. You think that you're a friendly individual, despite all of this.

You love working with computers, and have since you got your first computer at the age of only seven. Okay, technically it was your mom's computer, but let's be honest, you were the one who used it constantly. She knew how enamored you were with them from an early age (unlike your sister, who really didn't see the point of them, and was far happier with a pencil or brush in her hand). She brought it home from work one day -- the spoils of an equipment upgrade that her IT department had performed -- sat it down in front of you, and simply said three words: "figure it out".

And you did, checking out every book that the library had about computers, even the horribly outdated ones that had practically nothing to do with the modern 90's computer sitting in front of you. You learned BASIC, you learned DOS, you learned Windows. You explored every little facet of that machine, and what it could do, soaking up knowledge like a sponge. Now, as a computer "whiz kid", your relatives and teachers call you "gifted"; but the truth is, you know a ton about computers because that's what you chose to focus on. It's as simple as that.

This chilly March morning, you're dressed in your blue flannel pajamas and a coordinating pair of fuzzy blue slippers. The coordination is a complete accident, of course, as you have essentially no fashion sense whatsoever. You don't really see the point of it; clothes are there to cover your nudity and keep you warm, and as far as you're concerned, anything other than those practical concerns is unnecessary.

"Sam! Are you coming? Come on, it's 9:30 already," your mom calls up to you.

[Note: At the time of this writing, playing as a female character is going to result in a dead-end early on, as I haven't written many of the female-specific paths yet. Sorry for that, but it makes sense to write the perspective I know first.]