At the Twilight of Mankind

Part 2 - Chapter 1: (2/4) Introducing the Main Characters

THE XI HUANG FAMILY AND MADAM AMBASSADOR

** Chicago (USA), 2079 **

We are all tied to life and death like to a thread, hanging in the air, gently rocked or brutally shaken by the whims of life. Betty has always known this truth even after the rise of a continent long kept aside from the rest of the modern world at the gates of human dignity. Even as Ambassador of a United Continent, Betty still knows it. The long white scarf with golden patterns tied around her hair gives her slender figure the look of a celestial being. The whiteness of the delicate fabric contrasts with the dark brown colour of her face, ageless, spotless and without any pimples. She walks slowly down the small alley into a room as dark and sad as its atmosphere. A holographic portrait of an Asian man in his 60s floats above a closed coffin. Three figures sitting closely against each other are contemplating the hologram in silence.

Sitting between her son and her daughter, holding a handkerchief, her friend the senator is crying. How fast time flies. The last time they saw each other the children were twelve years old, and she was surprised to see how much her godson and goddaughter had grown. Sarah suddenly raises her head as if she has felt her godmother's presence behind her. The young woman's heavy black hair adorned with thin braids swings above her shoulders as she turns around revealing her beautiful orange-brown face. Her unique features don't seem to belong to any nation. She smiles at her godmother before turning to her mother to pat her gently on the shoulder. Nina jumps, snapped out of her trance. The sixty-year-old woman fixes a long moment straight ahead of her as if to delay this moment when her gaze meets again that of the ambassador who saved her life, as well as her two children twenty years ago...

** Beijing (China), 2059 **

"It's nice to see a familiar face here," the young woman said in English, laughing. "We don't see many black women in Beijing, especially at these types of events," she continued, grabbing one of the appetisers from a tray that a robot waiter was carrying around.

"I agree," the other young woman said, taking a sip of her apple juice as she placed her hand gently on her baby bump, almost automatically. She wondered which region of Africa the other women's accent came from.

"And what's your name? My name is Nina Xi Huang. I'm a senator of the United States." She said, smiling.

"Betty Sow, ambassador of Senegal, here in Beijing," she replied before asking curiously, "Did you say Xi Huang?"

"That's right. My husband's from here. How about you? Are you married? Do you have children?"

"Me?! No thanks! As if we haven't already done enough damage to planet Earth!" The young woman replied, bursting out laughing. She felt more and more comfortable as the discussion went on. "Husband, baby, these things aren't for me!" She said before continuing almost immediately:  

"And when is your baby due?"

"There are two of them: a girl and a boy. The birth should happen any day now."

"Good Lord, Mrs. Xi Huang! Any day except tonight, please," she exclaimed, waving her hands. The latter were long, thin, and delicate just like the woman's figure in her traditional dress.

Nina burst out laughing, delighted to have found good company with a familiar face very early in the evening even if this face, this figure seemed to remind her of all her insecurities as a modern woman: too fat, too short, too light-skinned, still not enough of this or that...despite all the titles and paraphernalia of her life as a senator of a major world power.