Leading Lights

Author’s Note:   This story, though I hope it can stand alone, is also intended as a sequel to my earlier story “The Rise and Fall of Project Usher”. I’m not sure about this, but the idea of the creature seemed to fit into the setting. Would welcome comments!

At first, most people, or at least most families, thought that they were probably the only ones to have survived the cataclysm that happened when humans went that one step too far in playing with nature and the universe. They wandered around, scavenging for food, arming themselves with whatever they could find, some desperately trying to salvage some trace of normality, if only for “the sake of the children”, some descending into anarchy, and others going quite mad. 

     But years passed, and these individuals met up, and formed their own little communities, and it seemed that, tentatively, there were the tiniest tender roots of hope. People discovered that they could still build both homes and relationships. Yet that was when they learnt that the phrase about old sins casting long shadows was not just a turn of phrase. 

     Nobody thought much of it at first. After all, even “before” – which was a catch-all term that even the youngest child understood – there had been dull days, and overcast spells. There was weather-forecasting of a sort, now, on newspapers printed on old presses coaxed and cajoled back into working order, and even on crackly radio receivers, but it relied at least as much on instinct and lore as on science – and was not necessarily less accurate for that! 

     A community that has faced the worst thing that could possibly happen can almost develop a sense of false security. A feeling of contradictory safety. In the world of “before” probably there would have been speculation and panic about it long since. 

     It was Amelia, the daughter of Hester and Hector, their community leaders, who first came out and said it. She was a young woman now, a teacher in the little school in the community and seen as a future leader herself. She had a keen intelligence blended with instinctive compassion. And she had never become quite as cautious as most people were in “after”. There was almost a tacit agreement that you didn’t say things that were worrying, or say or do anything to endanger that fragile reflowering that could wither at any time. But she said, as she and her mother were tending to their precious garden (they had once feared nothing would ever bloom or flourish again, but nature had proved stronger than those who played games with it). “Mother, it’s just not natural for it not to get properly light for so long. These aren’t just dull days, and it’s getting worse, and you know it!”

     “I know it,” Hester sighed. “It’s like the twilight that comes before night and not in the morning. It’s worrying. But don’t know what we can do about it.”

     Hester was a scientist, and had once been seen as a bit of a rising star in the scientific world, but didn’t say much about that now. After all, she had been involved in Project Usher, and though she had never suffered any abuse because of that, she still felt she had to tread carefully. It was a strange situation. Those who knew most felt, sometimes, entitled to speak least, especially on scientific matters. 

     There was a certain stoicism, or at least, an air of resignation, about the deepening constant twilight. When it did become acceptable – or inevitable – to speak about it – then “We have endured worse” was a phrase you often heard.

     But it was beginning to make life difficult. True, in some parts of the world, even “before”, people had lived through months without light. But they had the means to deal with it, at least practically. Now there was theoretically some gas lighting, but it worked when it felt like it.

     It had been happening gradually, though not imperceptibly, but the day – and it was the middle of the afternoon – that it got much worse, Amelia was out gathering herbs, and combining it with taking her dog, Derby, for a walk. It was only in the last few years that people had started to keep pets again. There had been much debate as to whether it should be permitted, not least because food supplies were still short, and there were whispers about “contaminated” animals, but gradually, if not nearly as common as before, it had begun to be accepted. The family found it impossible to imagine life without Derby now. He was a retriever cross, Hector, who knew about such things, had decided. Amelia’s younger sister Aurora, one of the “after” children, had laughed and said that he wasn’t cross at all. It was true. He was a gentle giant, and didn’t have a mean bone in his shaggy golden body. 

     Within a split second, it went from the twilight that Amelia had almost grown accustomed to to the darkness of a night when the moon was waning and the storm-clouds had gathered. She had, perforce, not been raised to panic easily, and her own nature was calm and plucky, but she would have admitted to anyone that she was scared. “Oh, Derby,” she muttered, burying her head in his fur, “I could do with a guide dog!”

     There were no guide dogs now. Those afflicted by blindness either had to make their own independent way or depend on their relatives and friends. There simply weren’t the resources to train them.

     As she hugged Derby, trying to gather her courage, she realised that something very strange was happening. Though it was still just as dark, she could see the path ahead, and was no longer afraid of going on her way. There was a golden glow, and it came from Derby! His body was radiating it, and he seemed to take it entirely in his stride. At times like that, you didn’t ask questions, you were just deeply grateful. She put her entire trust in him, and came home safely.

     She told her parents and siblings the story, and they didn’t doubt her for one minute. In any case, they could still see a faint glow in Derby’s belly, though it was not needed now as Hester had lit a lantern in the room. 

     Before very long, stories were circulating all around about such things happening. Dogs were the best at it, it was generally agreed, but there were some excellent cats and horses, and even birds who flew with a light in their bodies. 

     There was a veterinary surgeon in Amelia’s community, though he called himself just “animal tender” and when he examined Derby and the other animals he proclaimed that they did not seem to be in any way harmed by this. If anything, their health was improved, and they had shinier coats (or feathers) and brighter eyes. 

     It was as if the darkness were playing with people. It was never light, and they had almost forgotten what “light” was like, but sometimes the twilight turned to darkness. They came to rely on their glowing animals to guide and help them. Those who had no intent of keeping an animal before now cherished them and depended on them. Nobody was quite sure who first used the term, but it started off as lamp-pets, and then, before very long, was all one word, lampets. Even little children, as soon as they could walk, often had their own lampet – sometimes a guinea pig or a rabbit, and there was a rumour about a little girl with a hamster, though that was possibly just a tale. They were officially protected and there were most severe laws about neglecting or ill-treating them though few would have been stupid enough to do that. Those whose houses had windows put little symbolic pictures of paw prints in them and slogans like, Love Your Lampet, Your Leading Light. 

     A colleague of Amelia’s, a man called Jason, once, in what some would almost have considered sacrilege, said, “We’re all getting far too cosy about this. Acting as if it’s a great thing.”

     “What on earth do you mean by that?” she asked, though perhaps she had more idea than she chose to let on.

     “Look, don’t get me wrong. The lampets have been an absolute blessing, and I love mine dearly,” (he had a spaniel called Flora). “But we were all only just starting to build up what you might call a real life, a real society again, instead of being the survivors or the leftovers, and now we seem to have sacrificed the sunlight far too readily.”

     “People are still trying to do something about it,” she pointed out. “And we hardly sacrificed it!”

     “I know that’s the official line. But there are plenty who have started to quite like it. They can virtue-signal with their window messages, and wax lyrical about their lampets, and think that it never being light is a price worth paying.”

     “Jason, that’s an awful thing to say,” but there wasn’t nearly as much conviction in her voice as she’d intended. She had this horrible sneaky feeling that there was a degree of truth in what he said. 

     “We have become so fearful,” he said. “We have made a cult of keeping safe, at any price.”

     “Is it any wonder we’ve become fearful? We have every good reason to be!”

     “Look, I know it sounds ridiculous, and when I look into Flora’s eyes I can see nothing but love and loyalty. But it’s almost as if the animals have taken over, sometimes, and used this to take control. You can’t tell me it was just coincidence.”

     “I never tried to. But I bet you’ve read Animal Farm.” Books were still a precious commodity, both those that had survived and those few that were now being printed. 

     “I have, but that’s not why I’m saying it!”

     She remained convinced that such a notion was ridiculous, but it was undeniable that farmers did rely on lampets to a considerable degree. Everyone was secretly scared of crops failing. They had come so perilously close to it, and it was still by no means a given. There was still rationing. It was now quite normal to see farmers tilling the fields with great, majestic glowing carthorses, and those who did have some kind of salvaged tractor rode it with their lampet perched beside them, or scampering ahead. There was rumoured to be a black market in radiant roosters. Some folk used the scientific term bioluminescence,  which made sense of it, didn’t it? But of course it wasn’t that simple. “If it had started immediately after – what happened,” Amelia’s mother Hester said, absent-mindedly stroking her lampet, a plump Persian cat called Peregrine. “Then it would have made more sense. Horrible sense, I suppose, but sense.” 

     A whole new field of study and a whole new profession began to take root. Lampetricians were the most respected members of society. But it was generally agreed that despite the training courses, they were born and not made. The ability to restore a flickering or failing glow was treasured above all others. Amelia was pleased and proud that her sister Aurora seemed to be one of those with the gift. It goes without saying it was encouraged and fostered by both her family and her teachers. To do otherwise would have been unthinkable. Within a few years she was known by the honorary title of Magistra Aurora. The title of Magister or Magistra was only awarded to Lampetricians, and even then, only to the most skilled. 

     Faithful Derby had died now, and Amelia had mourned him deeply, but was deeply fond of her new lampet, a feisty, friendly little terrier called Bruno. His light was, she told herself, especially bright and radiant and even had a distinctive silvery tinge to it. So she was naturally worried when it started to flicker, but also reassured at the thought that her own sister was one of the finest Lampetricians in the land. 

     “More people are coming to me than ever,” Aurora said, gently examining Bruno, who looked at her with slightly quizzical but entirely fearless button dark eyes as she did. “And it’s getting harder.” 

     “But you can heal him?” Amelia asked, anxiously.

     “To be honest – I don’t know,” Aurora admitted, for the first time, and she could probably have only told her sister. 

     Finally, under her skilled and loving touch, the light in Bruno’s belly began to glow again. But the sisters weren’t deluded. It was not as bright as it was before. Or did it just not seem as bright? Without speaking, they both looked out of the window, and yes, it half-appeared as if, even if just for a few moments, the twilight was clearing a little, was thinning a little.

     They did not know if they were hopeful or afraid.