A cramped, claustrophobic space, more workshop than home. Every surface is buried under teetering stacks of obsolete tech: data-slabs, vinyl records, a reel-to-reel player, broken holographic projectors. The air is thick with the smell of stale tea, old paper, and ozone.
SOUND: A low, subsonic HUM. The constant drone of the city outside, felt more than heard.
AGNES (60s), cynical and sharp-edged, hunches over a Frankenstein's monster of scavenged parts. This is the OMNI-BOX. Its worn, nicotine-yellowed plastic casing vibrates in her calloused hands.
Its grainy CRT screen glows a toxic green, then an angry purple, then snaps to chaotic black.
SOUND: A sharp HISS of static.
Agnes swears, a low, guttural sound. She thumps the Omni-Box with the heel of her hand. The old plastic GROANS. Nothing.
Then, a new sound.
SOUND: Three sharp, deliberate THUDS on the plasteel door, a pause, then two lighter, quicker KNOCKS.
Agnes sighs. She knows the rhythm. James.
Her knees CLICK audibly as she pushes herself up from a low stool. She wears an ancient, quilted dressing gown, shuffling in threadbare slippers across the grimy floorboards.
She fumbles with heavy bolts. The CLATTER of metal echoes in the small flat. She pulls the heavy door inward just a crack.
A sliver of a brightly coloured parka—synthetic oranges and greens—is visible.
Agnes pulls the door open fully.
JAMES (20s) stands there, a beacon of garish enthusiasm. A shock of bright blue hair pokes from under a cheap cap. He holds a battered toolkit covered in retro stickers. He grins, a wide, genuine thing.
He doesn't wait for an invitation, nudging the door open wider and stepping inside. Agnes has to step back or be run over.
She turns, shuffling back towards the living area.
James’s eyes light up, scanning the cluttered room with a scavenger's reverence. His grin softens into genuine awe. He navigates the maze of junk, surprisingly agile.
He almost trips on a loose wire, catching himself with a hand on a stack of old circuit boards.
He kneels beside the device, pulling a compact multi-tool from his belt. Tiny lights flicker on it.
James peers at the screen. It flickers to life, displaying a distorted, black-and-white image. A grainy figure in archaic clothing gesticulates wildly in front of massive, rudimentary buildings of steel and brick.
SOUND: A warbled, clipped language emanates from the speakers, buried under screeching FEEDBACK.
James doesn't smirk. He leans closer, fascinated, his fingers hovering over the Omni-Box's dials.
He flicks a small toggle switch hidden under a layer of grime.
SOUND: The screeching intensifies to an unbearable pitch, then abruptly CUTS OUT. Silence.
The black-and-white image on the screen solidifies. A crowded street. Bulbous, ancient vehicles. And in the background—
A towering structure. Unfinished. Raw. A younger, brutalist version of the SpectraCorp corporate spire.
Agnes feels a deep chill.
He plugs a thin optical cable from his toolkit into an unlabelled jack on the side of the Omni-Box. A soft, green light pulses from the cable, a data heartbeat.
He turns a greasy dial labelled 'Flux-Modulator'.
The image on the screen distorts, stretches, then begins to scroll through a series of fleeting, impossible broadcasts.
MONTAGE - OMNI-BOX SCREEN
A) A bustling street market. Steam rises from food stalls. Vendors hawk synthetic noodles. The image is so real you can almost smell the stale oil and pungent spices.
B) A dimly lit speakeasy. Shadowy figures in trench coats. The ghost of synthetic tobacco smoke hangs in the air. MOURNFUL SYNTH-JAZZ plays faintly.
C) A sterile corporate laboratory. A single, pulsating, glowing orb hums with unseen power at its center.
END MONTAGE
He pauses, his eyes sharp, the humor gone.
He inserts a tiny data-stick into a nearly invisible port on the box. The Omni-Box hums a softer, almost melodic tune. The erratic images stabilize, flickering through the montage at a more measured pace.
Agnes leans forward, her grumpiness forgotten.
A new image appears. Not historical. A real-time feed, heavily pixelated. A darkened room filled with sleek, modern server racks glowing with a cold blue light.
A FIGURE, obscured by shadow, moves through the room. Tall. Imposing.
The image stutters, ZOOMS IN, focusing on a single glowing console. Lines of code scroll rapidly—schematics for an advanced neural interface.
Agnes’s breath catches.
The Omni-Box pulses with a new, frantic energy.
He presses a sequence of keys on an attached keypad.
SOUND: The Omni-Box WHIRS, groaning under the strain.
A small window opens on the screen, overlaid on the feed. A geographic map of the city. A single, pulsing RED DOT appears. It’s moving. Accelerating. Heading directly for their sector.
SOUND: A low, insistent ALARM begins to emanate from the Omni-Box, like grinding gears, growing louder, more frantic.
He reaches for the optical cable. Agnes’s hand darts out, closing over his. Her grip is surprisingly firm.
She peers at the blurry figure on the screen. There’s a slight hunch to its shoulders. An almost imperceptible limp in its gait.
James looks from her face to the pulsing red dot, now only a few blocks away.
James hesitates, then quickly taps more keys. The image sharpens fractionally. The figure’s head turns slightly, as if sensing their intrusion.
The red dot on the map is almost on top of them.
Agnes pulls her hand away.
The Omni-Box CRACKLES violently. It flashes a blurry corporate logo, a string of coordinates, then—
SOUND: A chilling, electronic WHISPER that sounds less like static and more like a name.
The screen goes black. The power in the apartment DIES, plunging the room into near darkness. The Omni-Box is silent. Cold.
But the grinding ALARM continues to blare from its dead casing.
SOUND: The heavy THUMP-THUMP-THUMP of tactical boots on the stairs outside, growing closer.
Agnes and James are frozen in the gloom, illuminated only by the distant neon bleed from the city. They have nowhere to run.
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