“Tonight’s special news report features a discussion with our own team of experts and a special message from the President, who has promised to douse the nation’s epidemic of violence with strict legislation. Before the discussion, we are releasing a video recording we are now authorized to share. The following footage contains disturbing images and may be unsuitable for children.”
The grainy feed of a campus camera—even though the CCTV had not recorded sound—was clear enough to show how one moment ended several lifetimes. At a round table in the heart of a bustling cafeteria, a young man suddenly pulled a gun from his backpack. He stood up and pulled the trigger, aiming at the students sitting closest to him. The sight of other students upturning their chairs and tables in a scramble to escape made the shooter smile.
It looked like he was… laughing.
Lexi’s heart pounded. There was no denying the shooter, no matter how grainy the picture. Even without the audio and the close-up of the serpent tattoo, she knew that face. Her mother let out a strangled cry; she’d recognized it, too.
By the time the cafeteria’s occupants unfroze from the shock of the initial gunfire, all of the students seated at the shooter’s table were dead. A bearded man leapt over from behind a counter and ran towards the shooter. The young man grabbed his backpack and fled.
The video footage from the building’s halls showed the shooter running as two security officers chased him, their mouths open as if repeatedly shouting at him to disarm. The final clip was located in the school’s mirrored dance hall. It was a shaky video recording from the Nokia cell phone of a janitor hiding behind the room’s floor-to-ceiling curtains. The footage showed how the officers burst into the room and found the student on the far end, facing one of the mirrored walls.
“Stand back!”
The shooter was screaming, facing the mirror as the two officers burst through the door. He gestured at them with one hand, urging them to keep away. “Stand back, I’ve got this! I can protect you!”
The officers paused when they entered the massive room, sensing they’d cornered him. One officer raised her hands and walked slowly forward. The young man shot at the mirrored wall, shattering the glass, screaming all the while that he would not be consumed. He turned to face the officers and saw the one still walking towards him, speaking softly. Before the uniformed woman could reach him, the shooter lifted the gun to his mouth and pulled the trigger.
The Sandman wasn’t going to jail after all.
. . .
Back in the studio, Sia nodded to an elderly woman in tortoiseshell glasses and a smartly tailored suit.
“It was a class exercise,” the communications teacher explained. “I’d asked them to use their break to look at themselves and think about how their lives might change if they saw, reflected back at them, not their faces but their character.”
She explained how the shooter always sat at that table. Yes, those were his friends. No, it hadn’t been the first time she’d issued such an assignment. She’d gotten the idea from the internet. Sometimes nobody took it seriously. One time it had made a girl cry, feeling guilty about cheating on her boyfriend. It had never before instigated a school shooting.
Then there was a Harvard professor who’d been brought in to explain how deficiencies at the molecular level perhaps produced an illusory effect on some manmade reflective surfaces. There were suggestions of black market ingredients inserted during the alchemy of mirror-making, rumored to evoke distorted or false reflections. He suspected that the defects didn’t appear initially. A build-up brewed beneath the surface and emerged over time. Some people noticed eventually; when they did, it freaked them out.
That was one theory, anyway.
“You know, like when you glance at a mirror and you think you see something in the corner of your eye, too quick or blurry to define, but it’s gone by the time you look back,” he explained to Sia. “You’ve had that sensation at least once, right? It isn’t a trick of the light. It’s the beginning of a distortion. The end of sanity.”
Lexi shook her head. They had it all wrong. It wasn’t the mirrors. Other people had looked where she’d looked and hadn’t seen the things she’d seen; she hadn’t seen anyone else dropping things or shrieking in El Greco or at school. It wasn’t a matter of defective mirrors or objects—it wasn’t possible that everything was defective; it would be the norm, and that defied the very definition of defective. Someone—someone with great power and greater ignorance—was scared enough to demand a scapegoat, and such sacrificial lambs are rarely to blame.
Sia pressed one hand against her earpiece. “I’m sorry,” she said, her other hand outstretched to silence the professor. “I’m being informed that the president is ready to speak. We need to transfer to our White House correspondent.”
The screen filled abruptly with the image of the U.S. president striding to the podium in the press briefing room, shouldering his way through a throng of hesitant politicians who wanted to be politically correct. The cameras zoned in on the fleshy face of the man who had been running for one office or another ever since Lexi could remember. His eyes glared unsmilingly at his viewers, live on national television. Lexi stared back at President Daimon, wondering at the mentality behind those beady eyes.
“Good evening, America,” Daimon said, unaffected by the scowling senators and rapt-eyed reporters in the seats below. “As always, I remain faithful to my promise to fulfill my vision of a greater future and to end the war on terror. I’ve tried to warn you of the ugly truth: that the real monsters are inside our borders, not outside them. Building a wall around our perimeter would only serve to keep the horrors within.
“According to every statistic I’ve read, the crime rate, since I took office, is the lowest that it’s ever been.” A couple guffaws burst from one corner of the room; Daimon’s eyes found the respective senators immediately. His face frightened even Lexi, safe on her family’s couch, so many miles away. The press room became as quiet as a graveyard as Daimon returned his unflinching gaze to the camera.
“We’ve passed 665 rulings in America—legislation, amendments, or initiatives, as my congressmen prefer to call them—and I’ve proposed a 666th which has been approved by the Houses today and signed. I’ll tell you why, America. The real terrorists are people you’d never think to call terrorists, people whom you’d never see as monsters. This horrific D.C. shooting is, in truth, the nation’s plea for us to pay attention to a very scary phenomenon. The time for mere thoughts and prayers is long gone.”
The president paused to drink some water. The silence of the room exploded like a sheet of cracked glass under the weight of a prodding finger, giving way to a torrent of questions and arguments. Daimon glared at his audience and waved his hands until the room reverted to its original unsettling quiet.
“Did you know this isn’t the first time I’ve heard rumors of defective mirrors causing harm to everyday Americans? We’re rooting out the cause in order to root out the consequences. With Ruling 666, within one week, all manufacturers and suppliers will be shut down and banned from producing reflective materials without governmental approval. All such existing material will be eliminated or replaced. We’ve got an incredible team of experts who have already found a solution for the replacement.” He glared at his audience, daring them to counter him.
No one did.
“Any and all public and private facilities found not complying with Ruling 666 will face the repercussions by the government agency assigned to their particular industry. This is, above all, a matter of homeland security and is not up for debate or compromise.”
This time, when Daimon took another sip of water, the room did not break its stunned silence.
“I know you’re all hard-working, God-fearing, money-churning folks,” Daimon concluded. “But you’ve been victimized, America. Sick minds have sold you sick products and you’ve got to watch yourselves. So if you see something, say something.” Daimon smiled a smile that did not r
each his eyes. “I pledge to get you through this. And you must help me help you.”
President Daimon left the podium and the room immediately buzzed to life again with a torrent of questions. The screen reverted back to Sia. The reporter had visibly paled. In the midst of her own shock, Lexi’s heart swelled for her for a moment in sympathy. Sia, a seer? she wondered fleetingly. Sia, an ally?
The reporter’s voice never faltered as she read her lines. Her tic had become more visible, almost as if that tiny muscle had realized its time in the limelight might be over and was pummeling a protest at the woman’s flesh from the inside. It wanted to break free, to scream a confession of the things those eyes had seen and had never spoken of. Sia was seasoned enough to know that her colleagues would have a field day with a delusional journalist who saw ungodly shapes in camera lenses; she had this tic to prove her resilience.
“Reports leaked from the White House are now coming, in fact, confirming today’s nationwide ban on the creation of all glassware products and mirrors. Such existing objects will be eliminated or will undergo special treatment to prevent what the president has termed delusional demonization. Please remember that any and all public and private facilities which are found not complying with Ruling 666 will face repercussions.”
Sia smiled tightly and bid America goodnight.
. . .
Lexi didn’t realize she’d dropped the TV remote until it clattered on the floor, breaking apart and dislodging its batteries. They rolled on the ground like two little bullets, taking cover under the couch. Her eyes remained transfixed on the screen. She couldn’t believe her eyes or her ears.
But that had all just happened.
In the weeks following Greg’s unsettling visit to the factory, Lexi had waited for a sequel that refused to play out. The second shoe never dropped. It seemed Greg indeed had more important enemies to confront. Eventually she stopped looking over her shoulder, never presuming those who crushed him would have the power—or interest—to crush her, too.
Daimon’s words stirred emotions in Lexi that she didn’t want to feel; it made her loathe him more. His voice caused patriotic heart palpitations. For every lunatic thing he seemed to say, he said something else she agreed with. Delusional demonization: so lame. Monsters under the bed replaced by monsters inside us: so deep. She could sense how such a speech, delivered with such aplomb about an issue so ludicrous, influenced listeners. They’d hear without listening, just as Daimon desired them to look without seeing.
It made Lexi want to puke.
“Lunatic or genius?” Pappou asked no one in particular.
“That poor boy,” Anastasia said, swiping tears from her face. “That poor, horrid boy…” The ladle hung limp in her other hand, forgotten. Cookie batter spattered the floor as she gazed at her daughters, the youngest obliviously stewing over a blue grammar book and the eldest gaping at the television. “Elias, what did he mean? All the studios and factories? He is shutting us down? Do you think we were creating such products without realizing it?”
“Ridiculous.” Elias looked like he didn’t know whether to laugh or to curse. His mustache bristled. “We’ve done nothing wrong. I’ve never had a customer complain of any such madness. If the government agencies wish to visit, let them. This is no economy for firing people without notice. Do you think people are just going to eat up this garbage? Defective mirrors inducing hallucinations? Delusional demonization? It’s nonsense.” He glanced at his father for confirmation. “It’s impossible. What about eyeglasses? And dental mirrors? And our windows, cars, and televisions? Basically everything. What the hell is this replacement he speaks of?”
No one had answers.
The opening credits of Reign erupted across the screen, accompanied by its gorgeous Lumineers soundtrack. Lexi ran to check her laptop, tucking her hair behind her ears as she crouched over the screen and the haunting vocals floated from the television’s speakers to her ears. The lyrics seemed especially relevant.
Social media platforms had already caught fire with the news, and young Twitter’s feeds were flooding with a new furious hashtag. #OnceUponAMirror, some of them read. #OnceUponAJusticeSystem. #OnceUponAFreeCountry.
Then Elias tapped the laptop with his fingers, forcing it shut. “Stay out of it. Go set the table.”
Lexi felt she would burst with questions she didn’t feel allowed to voice. She bit her lip, forcing the truth deeper inside until it caved her. She hunched over like a woman protecting her illegitimate unborn child, brandishing forks and knives and setting them on the table, each fork crossed over each knife like a coat of arms, a pattern of X’s.
“It’s probably just nonsense.” Pappou stood up from the couch. He picked up the remote, replaced the batteries, and zapped through the channels until he encountered the weather man with his toothy smile and harmless premonitions. “Money-making ventures feeding on hysterics, blown out of proportion like that Bird Flu.”
Lexi barely stopped herself from snorting. This was as much like the Bird Flu as otters were akin to ostriches. The leader of the so-called free world was admitting, at last, that the things Lexi could See were real. He took this truth and warped it, feeding off of America’s inclination towards bias and fear. How soon before the attention turned from the mirrors to the seers themselves? How soon until the president shed light on them, only to target them better before shooting them down?
Even in the kindest of times, history says that change has a way of evoking chaos. The president already was using the words “delusional” and “dangerous.” Lexi knew that the world was built on stereotypes, on labels. When the majority calls you crazy, you are crazy. Your value gets lost in translation. Just like that, a gift becomes a grenade.
“Exactly,” Elias agreed. “Hype.”
Pappou did not look at Lexi. He scratched his nose and swung his komboloi with one hand so that the worry beads clacked against each other like tiny firecrackers, as if he hoped the clicking of them would snap the world back to its senses, knowing also that they couldn’t.
“Politics,” he said.
8 / Fireflies
“No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear.”
–C. S. Lewis
Two suited and sallow-faced agents arrived at El Greco five days after the establishment of Ruling 666. They stepped out of their coal-black Chevy Suburban and handed Elias a notice of expropriation. Time to destroy the inventory and burn the books, they said. Time to fire the employees and scatter the team, time to end the customer manipulation and toxic artistry.
He had one week, they said.
Elias believed them. The polls showed Daimon ranking as one of the best-rated presidents of the past century, riding a wave of fear. But surely this, too, would pass.
People, being people, still flocked for a last chance to see glassblowers at work, a last look at an endangered inventory soon to be extinct. Evy accepted an extended leave of pregnancy, hopeful that things would blow over before her return. The other artisans of El Greco postponed sending out their resumes. It was as if everyone was waiting, secretly hoping the government would take it back, as if there’d be a Ruling 667 to nuke the previous one.
The night before the expropriation, Elias presented his wife with a home-cooked meal, however scrappily cooked, and Wegman’s finest Santorini wine to farewell their crumbling legacy. Armed with three mason jars and a need to distract himself and his grandchildren, Pappou surprised Sophia by picking her up after summer school rather than letting her take the bus. Then he’d shown up for Lexi, who’d been enjoying a quiet afternoon of reading in the air-conditioned local library.
Lexi hadn’t wanted to go with him at first. She was still mad because he’d refused to speak of Seeing since the night Daimon announced the Ruling. The engine stalled as he drove the pick-up right up next to the curb where she stood and glared, backpack slung over one shoulder and a new Robin McKinley novel in her hand.
“Truce,” he offered. “Let’s go for firefli
es.”
Lexi blinked. They hadn’t done that in years. Her gaze softened as she studied him, a tired old man in a tired old car. She’d never met her great-great-grandfather, of course, so she’d never know that her own grandfather was Hectoras’ spitting image. Gabriel’s face was leathery from the sun, clean with honesty, and framed by a thick beard that was striped black and white like a badger’s hide. He was tall, sometimes formidably so, but children tended to forget that when he hunched down on his knees. He did that whenever he could, so that their eyes were level.
“Okay,” Lexi said. “Let’s go walk. But then we’ll talk.” She opened the door and scrambled onto the pickup’s door-to-door bench seat, feeling monumentally adult-like. Sophie giggled as they smushed her in the middle.
Gabriel drove them home and left the pick-up in the driveway. He told them to leave their things in the car; the fireflies wouldn’t wait for them if they wasted time running in and out of the house, he said. The two wolves, roused from dozing in the front yard, followed their humans as they walked down the street and into the neighboring woods.
Fireflies were like fairy tales, Lexi sensed. They appealed to the young, the old, and the imaginative. In a world of detestable insects, these bugs were the exception. They had an adorable way of flying so whimsically despite their butts being on fire. Lexi had many memories of returning home as a child, arms full of light and bursting to show her parents how many fireflies she’d caught. After the fun had faded and before the bugs did, too, Pappou would unscrew the jars outside on the porch. Together they’d watch the lights float away.
Lightning bugs were nearly extinct in these parts, but Pappou had found a new colony in the woods flanking the neighborhood. The five of them took their time tonight, losing themselves in the dreamy moonlit twilight of the forest. The girls ran from tree to tree—beginning at the Firefly Tree, the heart of the hive, and spreading outwards—shouting at each other and at Pappou to hurry over when they’d found a bug. The wolves rolled in the undergrowth in a black-and-white blur, snapping affectionately at each other’s snouts.
The Wake Up (The Seers Book 1) Page 5