The shadow girl came up to me. Just like I could see her shadow, she could see mine. Well, I wouldn’t call her a shadow but more like a filled in outline of a person. I couldn’t see her facial features or color of her hair or skin but I couldn’t see through her either.
The dark figure of Carrie walked up to me. Out of the corner of my eye I saw her little seven year old brother standing a little ways off. There was something different about the small boy but I couldn’t name it. She had been bringing him when she came to meet with me. He was a newbie shadow hero so he couldn’t see me straight on like I couldn’t see him but we could see each other through the corner of our eyes. Eventually, when I was a full shadow hero, I would be able to see all shadow heroes from both dimensions, beginners or not. Both my parents are shadow heroes and so were their parents and so on.
Okay, you’re probably thinking, “Wait, what’s a shadow hero? What other dimension?” For your help I’ll back up a few steps to five years ago when I was turning seven, the same age as Carrie’s brother.
My mom picked me up from school and drove me to our house, a one story two bedroom one bath type of house. I got out of the car and she rolled down the window. She told me, “I have to go do some chores real quick okay, Gayle?”
I nodded. “Okay, mom,” I said.
“You know my phone number if you need it,” she said then waved and drove off. I quickly unlocked the door with my key and went inside. In the living room we had a small computer desk with an old computer. I walked over to it and began to turn it on when I noticed a CD. On top of it was a Post-it note that said, “Gayle, watch this CD on your computer ASAP!” It looked important so I opened the CD-Rom holder, placed the CD in it, and closed it.
The computer rebooted and words came upon the screen. “Hello, Gayle. I am happy to say that you are a 16th generation Shadow Hero! Your parents are and your grandparents and their grandparents and so on. The important thing though is the single rule every shadow hero must follow…” then the house began to shake.
I grabbed the arms of the wooden chair as tight as I could. It didn’t help the movement at all. The screen began flashing black and blue. The flashing got faster and faster until I found myself in a warp speed vortex, or in light speed like on star wars.
My life never did flash before my eyes, but the future did. I saw me and several other people all about 14 or 15 fighting…. Shadows, more like figures like you see out of the corner of your eye, and they were fighting back! The shadows were multiple sizes and in the midst of them I saw my parents! They were fighting some of the larger shadows. And this wasn’t an average fist fight: this was sword, axe, and hammer fighting. New people were coming in with garden shears and one even carried a lawn gnome! They were just common objects that had been made into weapons. What has happened to the world I know of?