Lock stared up at the ceiling of his darkened room, laying flat on his back on top of the mattress of his bed. He listened to the sound of the analog clock hanging in his room rotating with a tick,

tick,

tick.

It calmed him, such a simple thing. Even if the device was outdated, especially due to the micro AR implant in between his nose and eyes, Lock kept it around. Getting swept up in a constant rhythm, to relax to something you had no control over...

It was pretty blissful.

He enjoyed the sensation, but the blinking in the corner of his eyes clued him in to the fact that sitting around and doing nothing wasn't going to get him anywhere. The boy thought for a moment, causing a white notification with red lettering to slide in front of his field of view. His train was due to depart in only thirty minutes, and he didn't exactly have his EcoCraft on hand to get there in the blink of an eye...

The boy swung his legs over the edge of the bed, stretching out a little before glancing off to the side. Stray rays of light were coming through the blinds of his window, cluing him into a bright and sunny day. A bit of good luck, he didn't have to fetch his coat from the sports bag that lay in the corner of his room. Lock didn't really have much he cared to take with him to Casper. Just some clothes were fine, he could do without the various little trinkets he'd acquired over time. It was mostly antiques won in bets, pretty to stare at but ultimately worthless. It's not like Lock would have any trouble buying himself some luxury if he truly got bored at such a prestigious school.

He went over and flung his backpack over his shoulder, having made sure to fill it with some provisions beforehand. He grabbed the bag and made his way downstairs, hearing the noise of his parents chatting in the living room nearby. Lock briefly thought about saying goodbye, but he didn't care much. They knew he wasn't one for sappy goodbyes, so he didn't bother to warn them as he closed the front door behind him. If they had a problem with it, it wasn't that hard to call him or shoot him a message through his micro AR.

As the boy calmly paced towards his local station he looked up at the sky, losing himself in thought. It's funny that he was even going to Casper, all things considered. He's never had the luxury of going to prestigious schools, and up until recently he doubted that his parents could even support him financially through it. Getting his invite about a month ago was a nice, albeit unexpected surprise. He had a feeling that the school figured out what he was up to in his spare time, which wasn't the part-time job he managed to convince his parents of having.

His eyes trailed off from the sky towards the city landscape around him, seeing bright advertisements littered all across buildings through the device implanted in his face. It was an amusing sight, seeing the flurry of colours advertising some new pop drink next to the bombastic advertisements of new EcoCraft models. You'd wonder how the corporations got away with littering their ads everywhere, until you realised that people and other companies let the big names install a chip on the side of their house to display them and make some quick money. 

People are predictable like that.

Bored of the common scenery around him, Lock decided to play a little game to kill the time. A simple match-4 puzzler where you needed to connect the same colored blocks, aiming to clear the board given to you without getting yourself stuck in a situation where you couldn't swap to connect. It's a quick little game anyone could easily download that didn't require too much storage and he'd heard it was popular due to how difficult the later levels got, as well as it being fairly non-intrusive with the blocks being transparent enough to not obscure vision too much.

Though it wasn't really all that thrilling.

Killing time this way, Lock managed to find himself at the station soon enough. It was bustling like usual, with most people scrambling to get to their rides on time. Lock exited the puzzler and brought back the notification from before, seeing the timer now ticking away at only three minutes until departure. That was more than enough time for Lock to casually strut his way over, observing everyone around him. Couples making out, mothers guiding their children, some beggars crumpled up against the wall...

Dull and perfectly normal sights.

Just as the escalator on which Lock had stepped reached the top, he saw his ride arrive. "Pretty convenient timing," he thought to himself as he walked over, the doors opening just in time for him to not have to stop his momentum. Lock tossed his sports bag underneath a two-person seat next to one of the windows, laying down his bag next to the spot he sat so nobody would figure to sit next to him and bother him.

Time to find out what Casper was like.