A Touch of Hope

Chapter 22 - Sally

A sense of calm fell as Flipsey stepped into the R&D department. He had always enjoyed coming here. The wacky new toys created by the rebel boffins had always entertained him. Some were more useful than others, well some had been frankly useless. Quite often the boffins would create something for the mere purpose of creating it, rather than questioning what would be actually useful.

The dim emergency back up lighting hummed on, reacting to Flipsey's presence. The little light available was still a welcome relief to the darkness waiting in the corridor.

The two arc pylons either side of the door glowed with energy, creating a ring of light around each. A bolt of electricity shot from the left-hand one over to the one of the right, narrowly missing the end of Flipsey's nose. Most people would jump back in horror at this and refuse to take another step for fear of losing their head. Flipsey knew better as he was a frequent visitor so knew that the pylons were a harmless projection designed to deter nosey leaders who might come to order the boffins around. He had found watching the electricity shoot back and forth mesmerising as it crackled and zag'd through the air. The real arc pylons were safely locked away out of the prying eyes of those that may seek to use them.

The room was dominated by 3 large workstations, each comprised of a number of benches, floor space and overhanging gear. Each was where one of the boffins had worked.

The workstation closest to the door had been home to Sally, the no nonsense engineer, perfectionist who could throw together an engine within 60 seconds, her cybernetic hands working quickly through the assembly. Sally would always talk with so much passion and enthusiasm that her sentences would be spun out at about a million miles an hour, crammed with jargon, leaving Flipsey unsure of a single word she'd said. This would usually result in an incredulous look from her at his dumbfounded face as she'd sigh, roll her eyes and return to work. She was the youngest of the 3, barely over the age of 17. Trauma was no mystery to her. It had been late one night after a good number of beers that Sally had revealed her past. Her parents had died while very young from the Pax Plague so her house had been boarded up with her inside by the police state as part of the quarantine protocol, leaving her to die inside. Not put off by this death sentence, Sally had resolved to survive under these conditions and get back at those that had abandoned her. The food inside the house had run out within the fortnight. Starvation had begun to kick in after about 6 months as Sally had survived by chewing her own hair and fingernails and anything else that might give her sustenance. It wasn't until the 8th month rolled by and the water had been shut off that Sally had been forced to resort to more drastic measures. She had started with her father, a proud mechanic who would often smile warmly as Sally would bumble around his workshop. It pained Sally to eat his legs first but she had resolved to start from the beginning, leaving the rotting skin that remained of his face and the skull that gleamed a wicked grin until last. Each day she would careful slice another part of her parents off and eat it. The first few parts were difficult, even when cooked. It was 4 months later as she finished them off that they were wolfed down, barely hitting the sides. These parts were raw, the gas having been turned off after 10 months. Nearly 1 year after the house had been boarded up, Sally lay down in the corner as the plague racked her body. It started with a high fever, throwing her bodies into rigors as she would shake on the floor. This was then followed by intense itching that exploded through her body, infesting every bone as the insatiable itch plagued her body. It was at this point, most victims died, having itched their way through the skin and removed as many bones as possible in a bid to stop the itching. Sally had only managed to survive this stage having already eaten her hands, leaving her unable to scratch. Helpless as the plague ripped through her, as the itching further intensified into agonising, crippling pain, madness started to grip her. This was the final stage of the disease and raised what would have been a fatality rate of 80%, up to its fearsome 99.8%. The very few that seemed to survive it would be left lifeless and hollow, broken under the mental strain and reduced to an empty shell of humanity. The insanity started gently, a few whisperings that could be blamed on the wind. It would then intensify until it was a deafening crescendo of abuse and torment. Voices would pretend to be your friends to turn against you, others would scream insults in an agonising symphony. The worst was the one voice that rose above them all in a blood curdling scream, lasting for days. The visions that followed the voice would finally break the victim, swirling darkness would hone in around you and infect your every waking moment. Hallucinations ranging from being stabbed by her parents to being ripped apart by wolves had come to Sally, each time the pain feeling very real. Two long weeks after she had first felt the fever, Sally had woken to find that her fever had broken and she had rolled under her parent's bed during a fit. She had been woken by a research team battering down the door, come to collect samples from the corpses of her parents. Not wasting anytime, Sally had half snuck, half staggered out of the house, using her knowledge of the house to her advantage. It was then that she had been welcomed by the rebels and had found her home on floor 3 as one of the boffins.

Sally's workstation very much demonstrated her passion for mechanics and her orderly mind. Her tools were laid out systematically, each with a place to be. Her drawers had been colour coded for easy access to her drawers. Flipsey wondered if Sally had ever met Sam as they would have gotten on like a house on fire. In small clusters around the desk were a number of small engines, each as a different level of construction. It was these that Sally tinkered with constantly, her hands almost moving with a mind of their own and she would continuously build, take apart then rebuild each engine, even while in the middle of a conversation. Leaning up against one of the work benches was a 5ft long board, wires criss-crossing and dancing along its surface. The wires seemed to fan out from 3 plain circles spaced evenly along the board. This had been the hoverboard that Sally had been working on. Unfortunately, it was still in development as although it worked well enough, it was held up by powerful electromagnets which would fry any nearby electronics as the board moved. The leaders had not been very impressed the first time the board had been switched on. The floor of the workstation was dominated by a white orb around waist high. This had been Sally's pride and joy, a joint project with the 3rd boffin. It was a ball of pure energised nanobots that would shape itself around a sitting person and allow them to move at incredible speeds. Again, unfortunately the leaders were not impressed by the look of someone's head sticking out of a white ball, despite how fast it may move.