(Author's Note: Since the creator of this branch seems to be using scenarios from an alternate version of this story, thought I'd add a few in that vein.)
Jeff was a typical sixteen year old boy. It was after school on a weekday. His sister was elsewhere in the house, and their parents were not yet home from work. From his window, he saw the mailman deliver the mail, so he went down to bring it inside. Most of it was for his parents, but he noticed a large envelope, that apparently held a box of some kind. The return address was the local post office, and it said, Postmaster. He opened it, curious. Inside was a box, and a letter. He opened the letter.
"We are uncertain of where this package has been these many years, but it arrived at our facility this week. As you can see from the label, it was mailed in 2002. We believe the recipient still resides at your address. If this is incorrect, please contact us at the below number, as we are eager to address this issue."
That made Jeff a lot more curious. He got a pair of scissors and opened the box. Inside, was some sort of USB device that looked like a mini tower, a small pamphlet, and a CD-ROM. "Dear User, thank you for volunteering to participate in the Transdem Laboratories beta test for our soon to be launched product, the Chronivac 4.0. This is the first version of our system that can be used with your home computer. The recommended system requirements are noted below, however the more powerful your computer is, the better our application will work. The Chronivac revolution will be world-changing, and we thank you for agreeing to trial our product."
Was it some sort of classic game? Jeff was curious, despite himself. The family had an external USB CD drive they used to access some old files. He grabbed it, and headed to his room, curious what it was and if it would even run on his computer. He stuck the CD in the drive after plugging it into his laptop. To his surprise, it ran, and began installing, and after a few minutes, instructed him to connect the Chronivac emitter.
"Please enter user name." He entered his name. The software began to work again, "Analyzing system capabilities...system exceeds recommended requirements. Additional functionality is activated. Welcome to Chronivac. This product is in beta, and some features may not be completely documented in the interface.
What appeared to be a home page came up with three options. Scan, Presets, and Exit. He tried scan. A new window opened. "Scan local environment automatically, or enter target." He hit the automatic option. The Chronivac emitter flashed, and a 2d rendering of the floorplan of his house appeared. He frowned. The graphics weren't the best, but how had it done that? he didn't know anything that could do that now. There were two dots on the screen, one green, one red. The green one appeared to be in this room. He clicked it and a list of stats came up showing his name, age, date of birth, height, weight, eye color, species...there was an advanced tab.
"Holy shit," he said. The fields were editable. He played with his height, taking it down a foot. A save and apply feature appeared at the bottom. He wondered what that would do. Probably edit the scanned data. He hit save and apply. Suddenly....the room seemed different...bigger. "No way!!" This thing was like...magic.
