Secrets and Shadows.
Summary: "And above all, never go into the library at night." In the year 2101, Katherine is an orphan with no family, no birth records, and she's three years passed the time when she had the highest chance of adoption. Now at fourteen, she has a scant .5 percent chance of being adopted and is settled into the idea of waiting for the freeing age of eighteen. But four months before she turns fifteen, her dull world of hard work and little freedom has been shattered.
She's been adopted.
Pitch Black is the owner and head of Black Industry's, the company that makes 65% of all of the worlds technology and has control over the other 35%, and he has suddenly decided to adopt a ward. Katherine.
Her new life is strange, with a Level 2 citizenship, an empty house cared for by near-invisible servants, little to no connect with her guardian, and a list of rules she is never to break.
But when strange paintings and books in the library start to seep into her dreams, she begins to wonder,
Could the world around her be a lie?
Prologue: The Infant.
Winter in the mountain based town of Ombra was always bad. Snow fall could reach up to a meter in some places, mostly in the backstreets where unsavory business and the poorest of the poor lived, for there was no sense in wasting manpower and highly expensive machine life on those who were definitely fallen from grace.
However, the winter of 2086 was the worst in a century, with temperatures reaching -29 degrees Celsius on average. Snow was heavily falling two days out of three, and heating systems, even the automated city system, were breaking constantly from the snow piling on it, triggering the automatic external heat cleansing, melting the snow and shutting off the heating wires, only for the water to condense in the cracks and freeze without triggering the heat cleanse. The ice would, eventually, cause the casings of the units to crack and trigger the emergency shut-off to prevent internal damage.
And yet, had it not been for the snow, the babe never would have been found.
Mistress Anya Turner, owner of the modest Turner Orphanage, had been forced to take the Subway to her home, instead of the moving sidewalks termed as the Stick. However, the Sub could only take her within a block of the building, causing her to have to slowly push her way through the wailing wind and piles of snow for over half an hour.
Having finally reached the door, Mistress Turner was just about to key herself in when she heard the snuffle.
Turning slightly to the right, she found a pitiful sight. A rough bundle of slowly dampening blankets containing what appeared to be an hours old baby.
Now, Mistress Turner was by no means a sentimental person. She abhorred baby animals, and not even the cutest puppy-dog face made by the youngest of her charges did anything but disgust her. But this, this was far different.
Picking up the child, she hurried inside. Once inside, she called the rest of the staff to debate about what they would do with the nameless, family-less child.
Within fifteen minutes, all of the workers were gathered in the kitchen, the warmest part of the house, and had been filled in on what had happened.
"Well, was there a note?" The Baby Matron asked bluntly, and loudly. Matron had few volumes, and all of them were about twelve levels above quiet.
"No," Turner replied, "I hadn't thought to check."
"Well, hurry up lass, we have duties we need to get to."
With a sharp glare in the direction of the Matron, Mistress Turner unwrapped the baby from her wrappings until a note fell out.
It read:
Her parents are gone, mother in childbirth and father in storm. I won't last much longer. She was born at Midnight. Her name is Katherine.
"And that's it?" Asked the youngest maid.
"Yes."
"And what will we do with the lass?" Matron asked.
"Simple," Mistress Turner said, "We name her Katherine, set up the papers, and put in the system. With any luck, she'll be adopted around eleven."
"And if she ain't?" The maid asked.
"She'll wait to turn eighteen."
And that was that.