Bad Lights, Good Lights [Chapter 5.2]

At 4.45 in the evening, Imran and I arrived by motorcycle, excited to start planning how to take down our outer world enemies. In front of Sarah’s house, we waited. The house door cracked a bit and the head of Sarah’s mother, Mrs. Michelle popped out. Seeing us, her freckle-less, oval face beamed. She went inside for a second before appearing again, her hand gesturing to us to come inside. The gate of the house opened.

“Sarah told me you’d come,” Mrs. Michelle said as we went inside the house. She turned around to inspect Imran, grabbing his arm to take a better look. “My, it’s been a long since I saw you! You’ve grown to a quite handsome young man.”

Imran smiled politely. “Thank you, Mrs. Michelle. You look as youthful as ever.”

She waved away. “Oh, no need to compliment me. It’s all thanks to the facial care I’ve done everyday. I can suggest something for you, Imran, but your face is already 100% smooth.” She turned to me, squinting her eyes a bit. “Would you like to try the lotion I’ve been using, Merah?”

Ouch. She might thought she was being subtle, but she really didn’t. I smiled. “That’s nice of you. I’ll consider it, Mrs. Michelle,” I said. I turned to the stairs leading to the upper floor. “Is Sarah here?”

“My little princess? Of course she’s here. I wouldn’t dare allow her to go out at these hours, what with the recent kidnapping going on,” she said, guiding us to Sarah’s house.

That was a surprise. I hadn’t heard about the abduction. Taman Tun had always been a safe area, and even safer with the gated system implanted in it. How could someone get away with kidnapping others? I followed Mrs. Michelle, ascending the stairs to Sarah’s room. The air was quiet. What was Sarah doing?

“I don’t realize there’s an abduction recently,” Imran said, prompting Mrs. Michelle to elaborate. She was still holding his arm.

“It happened yesterday afternoon near my working place. Terrible, I tell you,” Mrs. Michelle said, shivering. “It’s a man’s daughter. He went to the bank to take out some money from his account and he left his daughter in the car to avoid paying for the parking rent. When he went back, she was gone. The car front door was unlocked.”

That caught my interest. We were in front of Sarah’s room door. “How about people there? It’s afternoon - there should be a lot of them. Some should’ve seen that happening.

Mrs. Michelle frowned. “That’s the problem. No one saw anything,” she said, and opened the door. “Dear, your friends are here.”

Sarah was inside, lying with her stomach against the bed while holding and reading a magazine. She closed it and looked at us with a toothy smile. “You come early!” she said.

She went to me and hugged me. She went to Imran and felt his biceps, winking at him. Mrs. Michelle saw this and giggled. “Well, have fun! I’ll prepare some snacks for you guys!” she said, and left.

Ah, yes. Snacks. Just what I wanted to dampen my raging emotion seeing Sarah flirting with Imran... and he smiled at her. What the fuck? I gritted my teeth and dumped myself on Sarah’s bed that was inferior in terms of fluffiness compared to Imran’s. The unsatisfying fluffiness didn’t assuage my feelings. Looking at them, I coughed loudly. Scarlet, Silver and Sunglow came out from our bodies.

They went to me. “Why did you guys come early?” Sarah said.

Imran took a look of the magazine Sarah had just read. “We can only be here until seven. Hmm... This is an interesting fashion magazine,” he said, and frowned a bit. He turned a few pages. “The clothes can quite revealing.”

“Believe me, they don’t interest me. I’m more to elegant, covered dresses, just how you like it,” Sarah said and giggled.

I snatched the magazine and set it aside. “Guys, focus. We have an important issue to discuss. Our enemies. Bad lights. They have killed a girl today. We can’t let them continue, which means we have to find a way to stop them from killing more people.”

“Merah is right,” Scarlet said, hovering near the study table at the corner of the room. “We have to take actions against them, and to do that, we have to know where they are.”

Sarah leaned at the head of her bed. “Well, that would be difficult. I mean, how? Clearly they don’t use the portals you’ve used. There must be a different kind of portal or transportation they use to come here.”

“We don’t have to find the portals,” Imran said, still checking the magazine. “We only need to find their rendezvous places, and I bet they’re abandoned buildings, ones that aren’t under humans’ supervision.”

“That is a logical theory,” Sunglow said, her voice vibrating regality, floating near Sarah. “However, I could not help but to wonder if they involve humans in this war rather forcefully. They can possess them to allow them to have a base that have access to human’s technology.”

“That is a good point, Your Highness,” Silver said in a soft voice, fixing a spot besides Sunglow. “Perhaps it’s a mixed of both - some bases are made at abandoned buildings while others are in humans-inhibit buildings. These way, they can expand their influence rather effectively.”

Silence took reign for a short while; each of us took time to ponder about Silver’s words. She made perfect sense - by using both kinds of buildings, the bad lights would have no trouble communicating with each other and enlarging their territory. However, there should be more bases in abandoned buildings, as mingling with humans would make it possible for them to stumble with a good light.

“Alright, here’s the plan,” Scarlet said, moving towards us. “Tomorrow, Imran and Sarah would look for the bases at half of Taman Tun. Merah and Damon would find them at the other half. We lights have to stay inside their bodies - we cannot have the bad lights know they are light companions.”

I held up my hand. “Wait, why do I have to be with Damon? And why Imran with Sarah?” I said, because the second part of my dialogue, if happened, would lead to things I rather did not want know. Sarah couldn’t be trusted with the guy she liked. And Damon was as nasty as his light.

“Because of our abilities,” Scarlet said. “My ability to move objects with Mauvine’s to change the nature of Damon’s body could do well as powerhouse couple. Silver’s illusion and Sunglow’s time freezing are good as stealth couple. This way, we can protect ourselves if we meet the bad lights.”

Urgh. Scarlet’s firm reasoning must be fueled with the fact that he was a soldier. He must be some kind of general or something. I looked at them. “Well, I guess we’d just wait for Damon to come to agree with this arrangement, which might not happening given his light dislikes you, Scarlet.”

“No, not exactly,” Scarlet said. “Mauvine shares some of Flaxen’s sentiment, but my kind with his has no problem at all. We achieve things differently but as long as we’re aiming for the same goal, we’re good.”