text: Cast Scott Bairstow as Tom Hobbes. Lieutenant Thomas F. Hobbes was just days away from being discharged from the Army when he was called upon for one last mission and sent into the virtual reality simulation known as Harsh Realm. He was forced to leave behind his fiancée Sophie Green and put off their plans to move to California as a result. Hobbes was decorated for saving the life of his friend and comrade Mel Waters when they served together in Sarajevo in 1994. In the realm, Hobbes was reunited with the virtual character of his dog Dexter, who had died before the series. He also came upon the dying virtual copy of his mother, Katherine, at the same time she was dying of cancer in the real world. Hobbes grew up in Columbus, Ohio. His name is a reference to the 17th-century English philosopher Thomas Hobbes. Hobbes used a Heckler & Koch P7 pistol in the Pilot episode before moving onto the SIG Sauer P226 in episodes 2, 3, and 4, and then a Walther P99 for the remainder of the series.  He also uses a Beretta M93R in episode 7.
  D. B. Sweeney as Mike Pinocchio . Specialist-4 Mike Pinocchio served in Operation Desert Storm. After that, he served in Yugoslavia, where he was severely injured by a land mine. The loss of his leg and eye prompted him to volunteer to go into Harsh Realm (in which Pinocchio has neither injury). In the Realm, he worked for Santiago before presumably faking his own death and going to live outside the fence.  He is forced into an uneasy alliance with Tom Hobbes after attempting to rob him upon Hobbes' first entering the realm.  He drives a modified 1972 Chevrolet Chevelle. His gun is a Heckler & Koch MP5K PDW.