Sanctuary

Chapter One - Senna

It was only a glance. Strange how things work out like that. She glanced down into the open box. The pair of devices inside immediately caught her eye. It was love at first sight.

The copper wire lay abandoned as Senna took one of the two devices out of the box and turned it over in her hands. It looked almost like a pair of glasses, except that there were no lenses and no bottom to the frame. Instead there was a small screen that extended over where the left eye would be. Senna put them on, mostly out of curiosity. A quick adjustment to the nose piece later and the thing sat perfectly on her face. She toyed with the buttons on the side, but nothing happened.

"Hey Wrench! What are these?" She stood, turned to her mentor, and pointed at her own face.

Wrench looked up from the motor, which was only halfway unwound at this point, and frowned.

"Those are HMDs. Head mounted displays. They were a big deal back in the wireless age. You could use them to talk to other people and display certain things on that little screen so it looked like it was in the real world. They called it 'augmented reality'."

"Cool!"

"Don't get too excited. The only thing they're good for anymore is collecting dust. They don't work without a wireless signal and wireless signals don't work with all the interference from the N-Gel." She waved a hand dismissively and went back to unwinding the alternator. "Did you find the copper wire?"

"Yeah." Senna grabbed the spool and passed it off to Wrench, the HMD still on her face. She grabbed the white box with the second HMD in it and brought it over to her end of the work table. Wrench looked up and shook her head.

"There's no point."

Senna placed both of the HMDs on the table anyway. They were pretty scuffed, but overall the external damage didn't look that bad. The screens were still fully intact. She investigated the side panel, mentally calculating the size and shape of the tool she'd need to remove it.

"You aren't going to get them to work," Wrench insisted as she continued unwinding copper wire. Senna didn't hear her, not really. She knew Wrench was talking at her, so she gave a hum of acknowledgement, but that meant nothing. Her mind was already working on the new project it had found. An ancient piece of wireless tech was far cooler than a rusty old truck any day of the week. She cracked open the side panel with ease and started troubleshooting, jotting all of her observations down in a wrinkled and oil stained notebook.

It took everything for her to tear herself away from her work to get home in time for dinner. Wrench actually had to take her notebook away from her.

"Your mother will kill me if you're late for dinner," Wrench stated plainly as she held the beat up notebook. "Remember last time?"

Senna groaned and slid out of her chair.

-

Her mother was already sitting at the table when she burst through the door, even though she had gone as fast as her custom motorcycle could carry her. At first Senna was sure she was in trouble, but then she noticed that the table wasn't even set. Her mother, Nami, was holding a letter. Several other letters were scattered on the table.

"Hey mom! You won't believe what I found today!" Senna started cheerfully once she was sure she wasn't in trouble. Nami looked up from the letters with tired eyes.

"I know, I know," Senna assured her mother before she got a chance to say anything. "I'll go hop in the shower now."

"Wait, Senna..."

Senna paused in the doorway of her room. Maybe she was in trouble after all. That wasn't her mother's nagging voice, though. It was her sad one. Senna turned back and flashed her mother a lopsided smile, leaning against the door frame.