Amber attempts to look into the future a thousand times, and a thousand times she watches herself and Hei run and die. No matter what they will attempt, no matter how far they will run and no matter who they will turn to, still they will be pursued and caught and killed. They will be shot in the dead of night while they're both in bed. They will be kidnapped as they walk down the streets of the third country they've attempted to hide in. They will be betrayed by authorities, by neighbours, and by strangers. Sometimes they will go for years before the chase ends. Sometimes they will not even last a week. Yet in the end, they will never make it to freedom. Not once.
But before they will die, the two will always manage to live together, even if briefly. And while Amber finds the sentiment to be foolish, she still finds herself seeing it as a sign of hope that she should keep looking for that one-in-a-million scenario where they will make all the right choices, dodge all the bullets and live out their lives undisturbed. Have kids, mortgages, grocery lists, ordinary problems where the stakes will not be quite as high.
She does this by following the paths Hei might take, not hers, because when she first made her Contract, the first thing she had attempted back then was to see into her own future, and that had been a pointless exercise, because seeing her future would change that future which would change that future and so on and so forth.
And every time, she finds that a future where Hei survives and is happy is a future where he will hate her. A future where he is always with some other girl: a police officer, a blind pianist, a child soldier, a fellow Contractor and so on and so forth.
Just not her. Never her.
And yet he will be happy in the end, and Amber decides that is enough for her.
But still, she keeps looking, telling herself that logically, and rationally, despite all the evidence to the contrary, there is a future out there for her with him. That she and him are not in any way a mathematical impossibility.
And she tells herself that she is looking for this future because she is curious, selfish even. Because curiosity is not irrational, and neither is self-interest.
So she looks into the future a million times, and a million times she watches herself and Hei run and die.
Consider this me warming up for Christmas.