Lena follows Bartek and Zuzka into a deserted city centre, where the blackout awakens something strange inside her.
Through the filthy glass of the underpass, the city lights blurred into smudged gold and blue, like someone had dragged a wet brush across paper. Lena shoved her hands into her sleeves and hurried down the steps, her shoes striking the tiles too loudly for a place this empty. It was already past eight, and the whole district felt abandoned by accident and left that way. The office towers above them stood dark and blind, their windows reflecting nothing but neon and rain.
Bartek and Zuzka had picked this place as if it were a dare. Bartek had texted an hour ago: You need to see this. Trust me. Zuzka had added nothing except a camera emoji, which somehow made it worse. Lena had almost stayed home, but curiosity had won, like it usually did when Bartek sounded too certain.
She found them near the rusted railing at level minus one. Zuzka had her camera ready, one finger over the shutter. Bartek was grinning at the tunnel as if he expected it to do a trick. Lena stopped beside them and looked from one face to the other.
"You dragged me here for what, exactly?" she asked.
Bartek leaned closer, his voice low and bright. "Watch the lights. Something keeps happening."
Zuzka lifted the camera. "Not every night," she said. "But enough to make this worth coming back for."
Lena was about to tell them this was stupid when every light in the tunnel snapped out at once. The underpass fell into a darkness so complete it felt physical, like a hand over her mouth. Lena grabbed the railing, and Bartek caught her wrist.
"Tell me you did that," she said, but her own voice sounded thin and wrong.
A blue flare ignited near the stairs.
It streaked across the wall in one sharp line, and for an instant Lena saw the outline of her hand lit from within, the skin along her fingers glowing with the same cold electric color. She stared, breath caught in her throat, and raised her other hand on instinct.
Light shivered between her fingers.
It was not a beam or a spark. It moved like something alive, gathering, pulsing, answering her. Heat rushed up her arm, bright and strange, not painful at all. Zuzka took a step back. Bartek stopped breathing.
Then a sound came from the stairs above them. Fast footsteps. Coming down.
Lena's glow flickered, brighter this time, and in the dark ahead of them, something else answered with a flash of blue.