Neon change

Kristy stared at her hand, it looked like it always did.  She hadn’t really expected anything to be different, however the feeling she was experiencing at the moment was completely outside her knowledge. If her arm had turned a new colour or into a liquid pile of ooze it would at least help, make sense of the situation. In her head she knew that the plan was sound, and everyone else sitting around the darkened room was in agreeance. Yet she could not bring herself to feel happy about it. She was the sort of person who liked to look at things objectively and analyse all the facts before she could agree to something. This time she had done that, as always and she had found no fault, just something inside her that said it wasn’t right, something was going to go wrong, and she couldn’t figure out what it was.

She left the meeting puzzling over what was bothering her so much. She felt she should try and talk to the others about it. She couldn’t just say she felt bad about it though, she had literally nothing to back it up except for a feeling which she had no words for. As she walked the cold wind stung her face, she chose to carry on and hoped that it would help refocus her mind. A lack of focus on the mission could get people killed not to mention the problems posed by failure.

“Yeah of course this is secure, it’s my own encryption” Kristy said to Anna from a phone she had recently acquired. 

She was sitting where she always went when she needed to clear her head and since Anna couldn’t join her up here, she decided to give her a call.

“That’s good because as much as I believe in what you’re trying to do I am not wanting to get mixed up in your resistance issues, life’s dangerous enough as it is”

“I know but I need your advice….” she hesitated for a brief moment thinking maybe she shouldn’t say anything then decided she had already made the call “have you ever had one of those, you know ‘gut feelings’ that you couldn’t explain?”

“Come on Kristy you my know gut is trying its best to kill me, there’s lots about it no one can explain let alone me” Anna replied with a slight laugh.

Kristy realised that it had been a poor choice of words given that Anna had had years of medical issues relating to the chemicals produced in her stomach and the debilitating effects it had had on her body. Still, that was a reminder of the sort of thing the resistance fought for. Anna had healthcare, unfortunately though she couldn’t access the level she needed due to where she worked, and she couldn’t work anywhere else because she didn’t have good enough healthcare. Still many people didn’t have healthcare or any of the other basic rights that were paraded as ‘luxuries’ for that matter. Kristy had been told it wasn’t always like this, still she couldn’t think about that right now.

“My advice is don’t trust that evil bastard” Anna added, and they both laughed again. 

They talked for a few more minutes almost like old times, until they thought that they had chanced the encryption long enough. Kristy hung up, disabled the phone, and looked out over the edge of the building she was on. She saw the neon pink and blue lights covering the walls up and down the street as far as her eyes could see. The Neon light bathed the three levels of slow-moving traffic hovering below creating hypnotic shadows. Tomorrow when the plan succeeded all these lights would change. The Pink and Blue would be gone (colours that most of the population had no idea as to why they had been chosen or what effect they were having on them, people just knew that they were everywhere and didn’t care any further than that), the lights would instead shine Green, White and Red. A simple yet profound change and when everyone saw those colours shining bright across the city the revolution would begin.  Kristy realised then that she had already made up her mind, she couldn’t let her team down and Anna was right she couldn’t trust her gut. Kristy walked to the edge of the roof and leapt off, landing silently on a car floating by and let her unsuspecting driver take her home.

It was finally time, her team assembled in the top floor of a building owned by an unknown person sympathetic to the resistance. The decor was standard office furnishings with a few floating plants, even though it was night it was easy enough to see by that cursed pink and blue light. The six of them waited silently for the signal. Somewhere in a different part of the city two other teams also waited in silence, ready to do their part. All three needed to succeed if the plan was going to work.

Moments passed like hours as they waited, Jeff fidgeted with his clothes, Sarah seemed to be counting something on the roof. Then a bright flash filled the room, it burned with the light of the sun and would have blinded them had they not been prepared. Then came the wind, hammering at the windows as if it wanted nothing more than to rip them out and attack those waiting inside. Again, they were prepared for this, and the windows held tight. The wind lasted only a few minutes until it settled down disappearing as quickly as it had arisen, now the signal had been given the team jumped into action running straight up to the roof. Quickly they set up their zip lines and slid down towards the inconspicuous hut sitting alone on the nearby hillside. Dean quickly hacked the lock, once inside they split into three groups of two. If their intelligence was correct, they would rendezvous at the control centre.

Kristy followed Dean, annoyed that the feeling inside her hadn’t gone away with the adrenaline, to her annoyance it had gotten worse. She had thought again about telling the team before the operation had started, they would have laughed though and said that if she could prove she was psychic then they would believe her. Of course, maybe she just needed to go and see a doctor, surely Anna could recommend someone. As much as she loathed to admit it, she did have a medical pass so she could see one with no trouble. Her thoughts stopped suddenly as she walked into something soft and unmoving.

She quickly brought her mind back to reality and saw Dean glaring at her, pointing to his fist held up signalling her to stop. She heard footsteps not too far off. Quickly they climbed the smooth walls of the narrow tunnels and hoped that the guards didn’t look up as they braced themselves across the ceiling.

Once the guards were gone, they slowly and quietly let themselves down and kept on walking along the concrete floor. They had to avoid several more guards patrolling the area before they reached their goal.

Soon they heard the hum of the control room. The door to it was closed and apparently locked judging by the red lights on the door. This time Kristy took the lead and worked on the lock. She managed to unlock it without too much trouble. Inside the lighting was as dull as the rest of the complex, the signal to start had also been the diversion they needed taking out the lights so that they had enough darkness to hide yet not too much as to arouse suspicion. Still surely the guards in the complex should have been more anxious she thought, then quickly dismissed it to refocus on the task at hand. They surveyed the room, there didn’t appear to be anyone else here, which was as they expected. Although the other teams shouldn’t be far off if they hadn’t reached the rendezvous point yet.

They took a few more steps crouched down low keeping their footsteps silent. Suddenly they heard a loud click followed by bright light filling the room.

“That’s far enough” said a voice to the side, Dean and Kristy’s eyes were having trouble adjusting to the unexpected light and so couldn’t make out who was speaking. They were able to just make out the shapes of their friends on the ground though.

The voice spoke again calm and authoritative “That was pretty impressive using a modified T-17 to cause a diversion, plenty of chaos, power reduction that can easily be overlooked, enough to keep us busy and for you to complete your plans. Still unfortunately we were prepared, we always are”

Kristy only half listened as tried to stop herself letting out a sigh of relief as she realised that the feeling in her stomach had finally gone however in its place was now despair. She thought to herself of all the months of waiting and planning gone to waste. If only she had said something to the others ahead of time this might never have happened. She looked at her arm again as disbelief set in, this time it was actually turning a different colour, how on earth had that happened? disbelief, despair, relief, and fear whirled around her mind. Then she did the only thing she could think to do, the only thing she seemed capable of doing.

Kristy laughed and laughed hard

“… so basically, assume we know everything, except what is so funny?” said the voice angry now with the thought of being mocked.

“Oh nothing” replied Kristy barely able to suppress her laughter “just apparently my gut isn’t such an evil bastard after all”