Saving Daylight

Lillian dragged her feet as her mother pulled her through the crowded temple, making her unhappiness at being there known in the heaviness of her gait. She had to do what her mother said, certainly, but she didn't have to make it easy for her by trotting happily at her side.

She glanced up at her mother's face, wet with tears that Lillian didn't really understand.

"I am happy and sad," her mother had explained as they approached the temple. "This is a rare, holy opportunity, and you should be happy and sad too. It's called awe."

Lillian had decided that she didn't think much of this 'awe' idea, not if it left her mother in tears. As harsh and confusing and difficult as the woman could be, she was still Lillian's mother, and Lillian still didn't like to see her cry.

If her teacher could hear her thoughts right at that moment, she would have said, "Such big words from such a little mouth," as a substitute for actually responding to the content of what Lillian had said.

Lillian was six. Apparently, that meant that she wasn't supposed to think, feel, or have any sort of impact on the world at all—a position that she simply couldn't agree with.

The fact of the matter was that Lillian didn't care about daylight, and she didn't understand why grownups did. That was what it came down to. She was dark-born, and she saw no reason why that had to be a bad thing.

"You don't understand," the grownups would say. "You don't remember waking up on sunny mornings to run outside and play. You don't remember the warmth in the air or the colors that it illuminated. We do."

Lillian didn't think that her life should be dictated by the distant memories of people whose only claim to authority was their age.

Her mother had been to the temple many times before. Some weeks, when things were particularly hard in the asteroid mines, she went every single day. Up until now, Lillian had been deemed too young to join her. "It's always crowded," Grandma had said. "The devout barely feel the person next to them, let alone a small child underfoot. She'll be crushed."

Her mother had decided six was old enough to be worthy of notice by the roiling multitude that pushed and shoved their way to the temple's center, but so far, it seemed that she had been mistaken. Not a single person looked down to see the small dark-born being dragged against her will through their midst. All eyes were turned forward and slightly up as the grownups desperately fought their way forward.

"We're almost there," Lillian's mother said, her voice difficult to hear clearly among the murmuring of the crowd. Her grip tightened on Lillian's arm, and her mother almost lifted her in the air in her haste to get closer.

"Ouch," whined Lillian, but as usual, she was ignored. Her mother had that look in her eyes, the one of pure distraction, and Lillian knew that she was far away, locked in her memories. She'd seen the look often enough, but this was the first time it had appeared without the help of heavy drink.

Then her mother's grip loosened, becoming slacker and slacker until she let go of Lillian's arm altogether.

Lillian had been forgotten. Another familiar situation.

She rubbed her arm where her mother had gripped too tightly, being careful to stay close to the dirty workboots and trousers that her mother always wore. There were a lot of people, just like Grandma had said, and Lillian didn't want to lose sight of the only one she actually knew.

Her mother was clearly well-practiced in the art of fighting her way to the front of the crowd. There was only one row of devout ahead of them, and as the crowd pushed and swayed, Lillian caught glimpses of the shrine through their legs.

She examined the shrine critically. This was what people came to see? This is what they risked themselves to lay eyes upon? It was just a rickety, tall table with a glass case resting on top of it. She'd seen fancier shrines and statues at the mining school she attended.

Why were they here? Why did it matter?

A metal bar, at waist height for the average adult, stood between the crowd and the glass case. Imperial Guards paced back and forth on the other side of the metal bar, glaring at the crowd. Lillian was only six, but she knew enough about how the world worked to understand that it was the guards, not the bar, that held the crowd back.

Behind her, the crowd surged. It had surged a number of times as people further back tried to get a better view. This time, however, someone's leg made contact with Lillian, pushing her forward.

Lillian stumbled and caught her balance. She was still on the right side of the metal bar, but now she was at the front with nobody blocking her view. She looked left and right, desperately, but her mother's work clothes were nowhere to be seen.

Panic gripped Lillian's heart. She was more than her grownups thought she could be, sure, but she was only six, only little.

A guard passed her, but his eyes were fixed on the grownups crowding behind. She thought about calling out for her mother, or just for help in general, but she didn't think she would be heard. She concentrated on staying behind the metal bar. She had seen what could happen to those who wronged the Emperor's guards and doubted that it would matter to them that she was just a child who didn't even want to be there.

She was only six. She was only little. The metal bar had been put into place with grownups in mind. To Lillian, tiny as dark-born tended to be, it didn't even touch her head. She learned this when another surge sent her tumbling forward again and she passed right under the bar.

If the Imperial Guards noticed, they didn't care. They were focused on the grownups, the real threats, and Lillian didn't blame them. There were only two guards to hold off every single supplicant, and Lillian found herself wondering why the grownups didn't just attack. If the shrine was so important, why did they allow themselves to be held back at all?

"Too many questions," her teacher liked to say. "If you keep on thinking so much, your head will explode."

"There's so little left," someone said behind Lillian, almost sobbing the words. "It's almost all gone."

This caused a wail to ripple through the crowd.

"Quieten down, or you're all out," shouted one of the guards, rather uselessly in Lillian's opinion. The crying only intensified.

Lillian took a step towards the rickety wooden table. It was narrow, its tabletop a small square, and just a little too tall to be structurally sound. She still couldn't quite see what lay in the glass case on top of it.

She glanced at the guards. They were both distracted, one on either side, jabbing their electrified spears into the crowd to scare them back. As far as Lillian could see, they weren't having much success.

The grownups in Lillian's life called her 'naughty' and 'nosy' and 'unprincipled' and a hundred other words that Lillian thought were unfair. None of them understood that all Lillian wished to do was understand. Understand why she had to follow a rule. Understand why the universe was the way it was. Understand the tears that coursed so often down her mother's face.

Understand why daylight was so important.

"The sun," her mother had tried to explain once. "It used to float in the sky, high above."

"Like the moons?"

"Yes, but much, much brighter. When the sun rained down upon us, the whole world was brightly lit, like your classroom at school, but without the need for lamps."

It didn't seem that interesting. Lillian had never had trouble seeing what she needed to see. It was only grownups, born into a world with light, who struggled to peer through the darkness.

The wailing intensified. Why did they care so much? What did it mean?

Lillian took another step towards the table, then another. She arrived at the two simple stone steps at the top of which stood the table. Not bothering to check on the guards again (she was already in too much trouble for it to matter if they saw her now), she climbed the steps.

As she ascended, the glass case's contents came into view.

Under the glass, lying on a black sheet of metal that reminded Lillian of spaceships was a puddle of bubbling light.

Lillian didn't know how else to describe it. As she stared at the brilliant, white-hot, searing light, all her other senses faded. For a moment, she was alone in a bubble of silence, just her and the last ember of daylight on the entire planet.

"Why don't they just let you out?" she asked the light.

The silence shattered. Behind her, far closer than they should be, someone said, "Let it out?"

She spun round to find that the swarm of grownups had followed her. The Imperial Guards were nowhere in sight, trampled perhaps, or worse.

"Let it out," someone else called. "Let it out!"

The phrase became a chant. To Lillian's horror, the grownups surged forward, arms outstretched, neither noticing nor caring about the small child in their way.

She backed away in panic. Her back made contact with the rickety, inadequate table that represented the absolute disdain the Emperor had for the people and their pesky 'light.'

The table toppled. Glass shattered. The room filled with screams of fear or of triumph, Lillian didn't know which.

A pause, and then...

Light.