Light the Way

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August 8

The address I'd been given was a small antiques shop in the centre of a typical-looking street (well, typical for Upper Division – in Middle Society it'd be luxury). The sign on the door read closed, but I didn't let it deter me. I pushed open the glass door, a motion sensor letting out an electronic beep at my presence. Not five seconds later, a man in a black jacket and pants appeared from behind a shelf of porcelain vases. His face was mostly obscured by darkness.

"Code," he said simply.

I frowned. "Code? What code?"

His eyes narrowed. "Are you here to buy antiques? Because the sign says we're closed."

"No, I – I got approached by someone. They gave me this address."

"Then I'll need the code."

It was a wild guess, but I went for it anyway. "Fight for the light."

He nodded. "Name?"

I didn't hesitate. "Kiran."

"Good. The meet-up's downstairs. Take the staff-access door at the back here and follow it down. It's about to begin."

"Uh, thanks." I moved past him, extremely conscious of his eyes, which followed me as I made my way to the door at the other end of the shop. The door read staff only, and when I pushed it open, it revealed a set of stairs descending first through darkness and then into a puddle of light spilling out of the room it lead to. I let the door fall shut behind me and started walking. As I went, voices rose up, growing louder and louder the closer I got, until eventually I reached the bottom and stepped out into the brightly lit basement.

A crowd of all ages stood before me, people as young as thirteen and as old as seventy all packed into the one space. At the head of the room, there was a low stage. A few important-looking people stood there chatting, and everyone else was turned to face them, half watching while they chatted with those around them. I saw a lot of handshaking, a lot of 'nice to meet you's, and came to the conclusion that we'd all been brought here, plucked from our various lives to form this one gathering.

A man on the stage stepped towards the front, asking for everyone to be quiet, and I slipped into the crowd to get a better view. From my position amongst the people assembled, the man looked like an Official. The same neat, slicked back hair. The same firm, all-seeing gaze. The same confident stance. In fact, that only thing about him that didn't meet my idea of an Official was his clothing: dark, loose, casual. Everyone on the stage was dressed in dark tones. For people so intent on bringing back the light, they seemed pretty happy to dress themselves in darkness.

He began, his voice strong and loud. "We have brought you all here tonight because we believe you can help us make a difference. We've been watching – monitoring work facilities, schools, shopping centres, recreational parks and other public domains in order to pick the people who will help us from the people who won't.

"You are all lucky, or unlucky, enough to have been selected. We originally chose 200, but there are only 126 of you as we speak, and this number will continue to decrease. Some of you will leave us, tonight or later, some will fall victim to unfortunate circumstances. Hopefully, most of you will be here for the long run. And we believe that together, we can bring about the downfall of the so-called, 'Black Wave'."

A murmur rippled through the crowd around me, and I heard things like, "Impossible!" and, "How?!"

"Now, we're not saying that we will achieve this goal," he continues over the voices, "and there is no guarantee that we will all survive this, but with your help, we will do our best to at least come damn close. Some of you may not believe this can be done and you may be thinking right now that this is a waste of your time. But know that you have all received our message and chosen to come here tonight of your own free will. We are not imposing anything on anyone.

"We cannot tell you anymore details. If you want to know more and if you want to help, then sign up at the front by the stage and we'll be in contact with you shortly. Otherwise, thank you for your time, and I wish you the best of luck in your darkening endeavours."

He stepped away from centre stage and hopped down to floor level just as the room broke out in talk once more. A woman standing near me span on her heels and stalked out of the room without a word. Others, too, broke off from the crowd and trickled out through the back. I counted twenty before I lost track. But most of the original crowd remained. Already, a line was forming as people went to sign up.

In the midst of all the movement, I found myself lost. I am only sixteen. Barely old enough to be joining secret groups that operate in basements under the cover of night. If Avia or Ryan or even Mia were there, they would have told me I was insane. People like us – we don't do things like that. We live in the world of normal, where the Black Wave is frightening but still hovers part-way in fantasy, where you go to school and do your homework and go shopping and watch TV with your family. You don't sneak out of the house to go to a mysterious address handed to you by an even more mysterious man. And you certainly don't sign up for whatever they're offering.

It must have been something in the air – maybe the atmosphere was getting to my head, messing up my thoughts. With all the other people signing up for the cause, it was hard not get swept up by it. Besides, the perfect opportunity to actually do something about the Black Wave was staring me right in the face. No longer did I have to wait around for it to get darker and darker – I finally had the choice to make a difference, to light the way for others. At the time, it seemed logical.

So I left my spot near the centre of the room and joined the queue behind a young woman with long, white hair.

You're an idiot, Kiran, my inner voice piped up immediately.

And I told it to go straight to hell.