<span style="color: #008000">Emory Holmes</span><br/><br/>Emory had three nicely sized screens in an ark on his desk and two holo projectors in front of them. All were scavenged, mostly from school each time a lab was updated. The desk holding these up looked ridiculous in comparison. It was an old metal corner desk someone left behind at one of his construction sites. Emory had spot welded extra chunks of metal on each time it almost collapsed. The rest of the room was just as mismatched: the bed was nice, but none of the covers matched; there was a nice, large rug, but the corners of the room had mouse holes; cool gadgets were peppered amongst old books and hand repaired electronics. It all depended on where he found something he liked or needed.<br/><br/>The computer under his desk was Emory's joy, though. It was built piece by painful piece, but it was the most expensive thing in his room. During the moments before Emory heard his name he'd been sitting at his worn desk, the hum of his computer forgotten with the rest of his room. His focus was on the holo and screen that held his schoolwork. Mostly there, at least. Another screen played an animated show, for background noise, and the last was playing the setup for the name calling ceremony. Emory always had trouble focusing with only one thing going on. He reached into the holo and placed his index finger on a vector, selected it by way of taping thumb to middle finger, typed a new scalar with his other hand, and grinned at the cartoon on his flat screen while the holo recalculated. This was all typical, aside from being home from work so early. People in Emory's neighborhood acted like this was a holiday, though the whole city knew they were only drinking and pretending to have fun because it might be their last chance.<br/><br/>There was a commotion downstairs. The name-calling was starting and one of his housemates drunkenly knocked something over dashing to the couch. Emory wouldn't be joining them; he couldn't stand how forced everything felt. Nobody in the house was really having fun. They were just drinking and being loud with force smiles on. Emory sighed as Halfheart gave his speech, someone downstairs made a rude joke about the man and the house shook with laughter. Emory returned to his schoolwork. His name was the fifth to be called.<br/><br/>It's hard to label the emotion he felt when he heard it. His eyes rolled toward the screen to see his own face staring back and he wondered if everyone stared into their own eyes like this and felt their chest hollow. His hands fell slowly to the desk, leaving the computer calculating meaningless data for the holo to display. There was silence downstairs now, except for the echo of their TV on the same channel. Emory figured the lot of them suddenly felt a whole lot more sober. Then he laughed. It was a quiet laugh; more of a huff, really, and his mind switched back on.<br/><br/>“That figures.” He told himself as he switched off the schoolwork without saving. “When I'm months from graduating and getting out of here.” He started a game on his computer and turned the volume up: an action game to keep him busy. It would probably be the last he ever played.