A Touch of Hope

Chapter 4 - The Gloom

Facing Amelia as she opened the laptop was a desktop identical to the one on the laptop now residing in her drawer, with one small change however. In place of the file marked 'Political Enemies' was one entitled 'Archive Program'. Opening up this folder revealed a multitude of files. Many of these held valuable information outlining an unbias account of that had occurred since before the Pax Plague. Many of these were written by Amelia herself, with close contact to all that occurred within Ragant's office. There was a range of other highly important files, however at the bottom was the most important of all; the Oracle Program. The Oracle Program was the result of 5 years of failed research carried out by the greatest minds of the 21st century. These minds had come together with the single goal of writing the code required for artificial intelligence, with the hope of it being able to solve some of the world's major problems. Held on Amelia's laptop was one fraction of the code that was written. Amelia was not able to understand it, nobody was, however it was common knowledge that millions of attempts had been made and none had been successful. Not even those great minds knew why. And now the rest of their research was lost, stamped out by the Police State and buried forever.

Opening up a file marked 'Resistance Members' she sighed. On the screen in front of her lay a list identical to the one she had just e-mailed from her other laptop. Putting a line through each of the names in turn, her mind slipped back to the email that had killed them all. The fresh horror of the countless executions she had watched out of the bay windows behind her forced itself into her head. The frenzied cheering and whistles from the crowd as they yearned for blood, the sweat the gleamed from the prisoners forehead, the awkward twitching as the neck snapped and the body swung from the noose. Her stomach turned again. Amelia slammed her laptop closed, snapping her back into the present. She could taste her own sweat and tears, making an unusual cocktail or sadness and bitterness in her mouth. Swapping the laptops back over, she took the hard disk drive placed it into her black leather bag next to her make up and stood up to leave. Looking back once more to check that her tracks had been covered and her drawer was closed, she shivered. The gloom had crept into the room. It danced around taunting her, laughing at her secret. She didn't look back again. She left the room as quickly as her heels and skirt would let her.

Stepping out of into the dark and foggy night, he paused momentarily as she caught her reflection in the glass of the door. Her make up had begun to appear patchy as her dark, pale skin started to show through. She poked and massaged her face with both hands, contemplating whether to return to the teasing gloom or to press on. Letting the door go, she pushed on into the night. The clicking of her heels rebounded off the brick walls on both sides of the road as she marched on. Piercing the night, the clicking seemed eerie in the silence that seeped into street. For all Amelia knew at that moment she could have been the last person alive. As she glanced up nervously at the lamppost she had stopped under she contemplated this possibility. The gloom pressed hard down on her, the mist swirling around her, teasing at her legs. She shivered again, unsure as to whether it was from the ambiance or the cold. Above, the ancient gargoyals cackled as they swam in and out of vision. Amelia swayed to one side, smacking into the lamppost, her fingers clawing for it. Grabbing a hold of the pole for safety as she slid down it, the ground seemed to rush up to meet her. Tendrils of mist reached in to grab at her skirt. Still the darkness crept in. The ringing in Amelia's ears matched her ragged heavy breathing that could clearly be seen adding more haze to the mist. Still the stonework above laughed at her discomfort as Amelia felt sure they knew, everyone knew. She was doomed to swing on the end of a rope.

It was at the moment that cutting through the oppressive gloom, filling her full of warmth, her name rang out, "Amelia!". Clearing her vision for half a moment, Amelia could see the dark figure against the mist standing beneath the orange orb of the next street lamp. The street lamp she could have sworn wasn't there earlier.