The Silver Shore was waking up slowly, as if someone was carefully turning up the volume knob. First the sea - a long, low hum. Then the seagulls - squawking over the quay. Finally, the tram as it moved out from under the depot, leaving a thin line of crackling on the cold air. Mika heard something else that the rest of the people didn't seem to pick up on: the quiet singing of wires over the street, the jangling of transformers on the corner and the rhythm of fluorescent lights in the school. As she passed under a street lamp, its light greeted her with a barely perceptible twitch - like a nod. In eighth grade, few things were controllable. Homework came in waves, once a minor tide, once a tsunami. Gossip spread faster than the wind from the sea. But the current, he responded to Miki's voice. When she was thoughtful, the lamps seemed to fall silent. When she couldn't fall asleep, she calmed the city installations with a quiet chant and the whole block breathed evenly. - 'Again,' she whispered as the fluorescent light above her bench in the physics room squealed in a high-pitched tone. The voice pinched her ears. Mr Luczak drew a simple circuit on the blackboard and turned towards the classroom. - 'Electricity flows from plus to minus,' he began, and Mika dipped slowly, almost inaudibly. Nothing much, three notes, shifted quietly downwards. The fluorescent light blinked and went silent. Kaja, sitting a bench away, raised an eyebrow. After the lesson, Kaja jumped down the last stair as she always did, no holds barred, with shoes that were too heavy. - 'You do that,' she said, not as an accusation, more like a statement that has been on someone's tongue for weeks. Mika shrugged her shoulders. - I wish. It's just a coincidence. - Sure. And I just accidentally drew three pages of cables in my notebook yesterday that looked like... like notes. - Kaja smiled with one corner. Her hair was the colour of wet pine, cut crooked, as if she was trying to catch some rhythm in the curve herself. - See you tonight? The lighthouse is supposed to shine longer, because the tide and all that. The Silver Bank lighthouse stood at the end of a concrete tongue that jutted into the water. The White Needle - so the elders said - was flat by day, like a postcard picture, and by night like a monster's only eye watching to make sure no one lost their way. That evening the air was too light for November. Everything sounded like before a storm, only the sky over the sea was as smooth as glass. Mika climbed up to the roof of her block of flats as she had been doing for years - up the guttering, then through the metal steps that held only half a word. Upstairs it was cold and smelled of soot. The sea stretched out like a dark vinyl record, and the lighthouse drew a thin beam across the sky every few seconds. From the pocket of her sweatshirt Mika pulled out an old walkman, not to turn it on. She liked the weight of plastic and metal, the click of a button that no longer did anything. Kaja claimed it was her talisman. Maybe. The lights were coming on in the city. First the chipped windows of an old cinema, then the neon of a bakery that had been trying to be fixed for a week. Mika put her hand on the hot chimney. Under her fingers she felt the roughness of the paint and the tiny vibrations. A subcutaneous pulse. A current. Then the lantern changed its rhythm. Instead of a steady, lazy rotation, the beam trembled, accelerated, as if it had lost a step for a moment. Mika took a breath and closed her eyes. The roar of the ship's siren reached her ears, but beneath it, deeper down, something began to sequence. The flickering of streets. The clicks of staircases. The rasp of lifts. The city shifted to a different beat. The phone vibrated in the pocket of his jeans. The display flashed an unfamiliar number, no name. One word: Come. Mika swallowed her saliva. She touched the glass with her thumb. In the darkness, the letters looked like they had been cut with a blade from black. Her palate was as dry as sand. As she raised her head, the lantern beam suddenly shifted towards the land. No, it didn't just shift. It stopped on the rooftops, as if searching. And then it hit her. She felt warmth on her skin, even though she was far away. For a second, everything became sharp like a note that was too loud. The sky vibrated, the sea held its breath. From inside the city, a long tone flowed towards her - not human, not animal. The tone of a thing. - Mika! - Kaja climbed onto the roof louder than usual. Her cheeks were red from running. - 'Can you see it? - I hear it,' Mika replied without smiling. - 'What is it? - I don't know. - The sound was coming closer, but not through the air. Through the network. Like a wave in the pipes. - Someone is writing to me. I think... - she broke off. The phone vibrated again in her pocket. A second message: You're not alone. Kaja came closer, stood next to her, shoulder to shoulder. From the lower streets came their echoing footsteps and laughter. No one looked up. - How long have you had this...? - asked Kaja after a moment of silence. Mika shrugged her shoulders, although she knew exactly. The first time it happened was when she was nine years old and lost at the marina. That day smelled of fish and paint. She sat then under a tall cable pole and cried so quietly that no one heard her. But the poles did hear. They answered her with singing so quietly that she found her way alone. Since then the current has laughed with her, whispered, whined, sometimes shouted. It has always been there. - All I have to do is tune in,' she whispered. - And I'll understand what it wants. Kaja looked at her with a seriousness she rarely used. - What if this thing doesn't want to be understood? A single crackle came from the harbour, like a shot from a baton. All the lamps by the quay lit up at once, one after the other, like piano keys played with a rapid range. Mika felt the hairs on her forearms stand up. She put her hand out in front of her, unconsciously, as if to touch the light. In the radius of the lantern, particles of vapour swirled, like specks of gold in the water. - Don't do that - Kaja grabbed her by the cuff. - After all, you... - she hesitated. - I don't know what you're going to do. - I don't either - Mika admitted. - But it's calling me. Do you hear it? The city is playing. For a moment they both stood still, like two notes suspended above a stave. The sheets of clouds above the horizon parted, showing the pale rim of the moon. The sound of a tram was coming from the distance, and the night wafted beneath their feet. The phone vibrated for the third time. Mika felt her chest grow tight. She opened the message. There were no words. There was a graph. A pine wave that started low and suddenly soared upwards, violent as a heart attack. Underneath, the numbers. 50 Hz. 60. 70. 100. - Oh God,' Kaja whispered. - It's growing. The city responded. First with a quiet sigh of lifts. Then a hiss, as if someone had unscrewed a full kettle. A quiet murmur rolled from each side of the Silver Bank, invisible but heavy, like an approaching train. The lighthouse changed its rhythm again. The beam jumped like a heart starting to run. - If I don't brake it... - Mika didn't finish. She didn't know where the word came from. To brake. It came along with the sound. Kaja let go of her sleeve. - Don't do anything stupid. Or do it fast. Mika closed her eyes. She felt like she was standing on a huge instrument waiting to be touched. Inhale. Exhale. In her head she set the key. C, then H, then lower. She relaxed her fingers. And then something whined quietly behind their backs. From a dark breach at the hatch to the roof emerged a boy wearing a jacket with the city's energy logo on it. He didn't look like a worker. Too young. In his eyes was the reflection of the lamppost, bright and liquid, as if the light could anchor itself there. - 'You're late,' he said without greeting. There was a cable sticking out of his pocket, thin as a shoelace. - A wave is about to go. - What wave? - Kaja took half a step back. The boy did not look away from Mika. - One that doesn't choose. Either you carry it, or it will carry you. The air thickened. Kaji's hair lifted from the electricity. Mika felt warmth spilling over her hand. The shadow of the lantern rippled across their faces, faster and faster, shorter and shorter. Another crackle came from the distance, and the wires above the street wailed in one long tone. Mika had the feeling that she was standing on the edge of something that could not be undone. She let out a breath and raised her hand higher. At the same moment, the sky burst into a half-silent flash, and a bright, frothy ridge came from the harbour side - not water, not wind. A pure current.