"What the hell..." Silva blankly stared at the source of the blue light. She had no idea what it was. She just kept on staring at the blue floating bead. It was barely comparable with a raindrop in size and around it, there was undulating blue liquid encompassing it.

She watched as the liquid around the bead started to form a small droplet underneath it. It slowly grew bigger and bigger until finally came loose and dropped down to the ground. But before the droplet could reach the ground it vanished mid-air, leaving no traces.

Slowly she entered the room circling around the bead. Whatever it was it was beautiful and if only she reached out it could become hers. At this moment Silva shuddered. Not even mentioning the danger this item could possess the thought of touching it came too easily to her.

Silva licked her lips and started to feel out her surroundings and then herself. After a short while, a silent horror settled in. No matter how she looked at it she felt that her ability was moving too smoothly. While never hard for her it still took her some conscious effort to use it but at this moment standing before the mysterious object, there was almost no effort involved.

With an alarm, she again looked at the bead trying to understand what it was. Under the blue mass of liquid, she could make out that it was almost transparent and crystal-like. Silva felt the urge to touch it again. Almost like the bead was calling for her. No, she was sure that it was!

“That's impossible...” Silva muttered, but before she could stomach the situation she heard someone rushing down the stairs and the next moment she realized that she was in a dead-end with nowhere to run.

She quickly made sure that her ability was still working and in a panic tried to find a place where she could be away from comers eyes just in case. But as she already knew the room was empty aside from the floating bead. She tucked herself in a corner and hoped that whoever came would not be able to find her. No matter how she looked at it the clearly supernatural floating bead was far above what someone like her should be dealing with. In her mind, there was a not so small of a possibility that whoever had hidden the bead here could find her.

Silva watched the man, from whom she had stolen the key from, charge into the room. He was still in his underwear, but that did not take away from his imposing presence and she felt that he was someone who was used to be in charge.

He was not tall, Silva approximated his height to be about 1.70 meters. He had a short trimmed, grizzled beard and hair, piercing blue eyes. While the man’s age was clearly showing he still had a wiry body full of power.

Silva watched the man carefully examine the room. Her heart rate was going higher and higher and she felt his gaze slide past her position several times. In the end, the man turned around, but before she could sigh in relief, he turned again. His gaze once again scanned the room and Silva felt like it was concentrating in the corner where she was for a moment. Silva feared the worst, but the man, after a minute of silence, turned around again and this time when he left he did not look back.

Silva realized that the man could close the doors upstairs and that it would leave her locked in, so she started to rush after him. Nervously she looked at the back in front of her. She wanted to distance herself more, but the circumstances as they were asked for the opposite.

As the man exited back to his workroom Silva barely managed to slip out with him. Her leg did get caught by the closing door making them stop midway, but the man’s attention was elsewhere as he was now entering his bedroom. She used the chance to return to the hallway.

Before she could get very far the man followed her footsteps and a loud shout resounded through the building.

“Wake up! We have an intruder!”

As Silva rushed to the exit she glanced back and saw the man standing in the doors with a bathrobe draped over his shoulders.

The loud shout had done its work and Silva heard a commotion rising in the rooms she passed. As she reached the exit she heard first people exit their rooms behind her.

In her rush, she reached for the exit doors only for them to be thrown open and as a man rushed through them. Silva did not manage to avoid the collision and was bumped aside hitting the wall.

Fortunately for Silva, the door guard, in the rising commotion only glanced at her direction before returning his attention at the now very loud hallway. Silva could hear their leader shout commands from her back, but she did have the leisure to listen. She used the chance of the entrance doors still being open and swiftly exited.

When she reached a respectful distance from the building she finally looked back. Panting she listened to the shouting coming from the building but she could not make out what they were saying.

There were now several men spreading out searching for any signs of her. Silva gave a final glance back and left the building now buzzing with activity. One thing was clear, she would not be returning to this place. It was too dangerous.

As Silva was slowly making her way back home she found her head swirling full of confusing thoughts. What was the thing in the basement? Why did she think it was calling for her? What of the men who stayed there? What was that blue liquid? Did she really feel stronger when being close to the blue bead? Will they find out it was her?

Silva agonized about these questions and many more. She knew too little. She was just a girl, not yet even an adult. The only thing she decided was to not call the police. Discovering something like that in the Oldsteel could bring unwanted attention to the whole city, including her and her friends.

A hidden world under the mundane and reluctantly she was part of it in some capacity. “Honestly, it’s scary…” Silva shivered. First, she thought it was from the cold, but the trembling did not stop. “What now?” She was lost of what to do.

Absent-mindedly she pulled out her phone. It was 2:46. Only a couple of hours and her world had once again gone through irreversible changes. She wanted to talk with someone, but it was too late. There was no doubt that both of her friends were already asleep. And even if they were not, what then? She could not just intrude on their hospitality. They had their own families and she did not want them to receive a weird girl in the middle of the night.

“Yes, I’ll go home and try to get some sleep… It is for the best. For the best...” Silva thought to herself. As distracted as she was it took her a moment do discover that she had already started a call. She panicked but it was already too late to hang up.

“Hello?” Mika’s clearly drowsy voice asked for Silva’s attention.

“Ah, hello! Sorry, I did not mean… I did not want to wake you up...” Silva apologized for her blunder.

“Silva? Is everything alright?” Mika’s demanded her tone now having a steely undertone full of worry. After a short silence, Mika received an honest answer.

"… I just wanted… Needed to talk with someone," Silva surrendered.

“Oh, wait a sec...” Rustling sounds came from the speaker. “So, umm, what did you want to talk about?”

“I... You know, I messed up...” Silva confessed.

“What did you do?”

“Ah, I, wanted to help... I went to the Refuge and… I saw something...” Silva did not know where to start.

“You WHAT!” Mika interrupted. “Where are you now?”

"Um, why?" Silva asked. "I am… I am on my way back home." She, in the end, answered.

"Just tell exactly where you are so I can go and get you." From the sounds, it seemed that Mika was getting dressed.

“That's, that is not necessary!” Silva panicked, she really did not plan to bother her friend that much. It was just an accident that she had made the call at all.

"Just tell me already, I am awake, dressed and ready, ah, a moment, I’ll talk with mom," Silva heard a muffled conversation until Mika gave her a question. "So, where?"

“You really shouldn't... It's really late...” But an oppressing silence halted her feeble resistance. Silva felt truly happy for having such a good friend and even her trembling had stopped at some point. Finally, she told her whereabouts.

–

Silva trudged forward. She was still regretting her rash actions earlier. Only now that regret was overshadowed by even larger one – waking up Mika. Silva felt that there was no need to go as far as come and get her. She was fully capable of finding her way to Mika’s house, but it would be a lie if she said that she was not grateful.

Street-lights illuminated her path forward and she faithfully kept going, there was no one else around and only a rare car passing disturbed the nights’ peace. The nights were getting colder and colder, it was quite lucky that she had dressed so heavily, even if the reason was not keeping herself warm.

Silva found a bench near the walkway and decided to wait for Mika there. She felt slightly nervous without her ability active, but this way Mika would have no problems finding and greeting her first. Despite that, she was starting to fidget and fearing someone would come and ask what a minor like her was doing in the middle of the night outside.

When Silva heard footsteps she turned to see who was the comer. To her relief it was Mika. She was wearing a brown jacket, black jeans, sneakers and a blue winter beanie with her brown, uncombed hair sticking out from it. Her cheeks red from the cold she walked in a brisk pace. Silva felt the girls searching gaze finding her as Mika fastened her pace.

“Are you really okay?” Mika scrutinised Silva. The girl clearly had rushed and was out of breath. The quick breathing made Mika appear surrounded by white clouds.

"I am fine, really..." Silva trailed off. "Well, you know… Apart from the whole breaking in a dangerous place thing," She joked, hoping Mika would not scold her too harshly.

“Oh, so now you know it was dangerous!” Mika fumed. “You call late at night, tell me you want to talk, tell me you messed up and then announce that you broke in a place I and Steven clearly warned you not to go to! Do you know how worried I was? What were you even hoping to achieve by going there? What were you thinking? Did they see you? Are you in danger?” Silva shook her head in denial.

Instead of the lecture, Silva was expecting Mika let out a sigh and plopped down next to her. The next moment Silva found herself in Mika’s embrace with her voice whispering in her ear.

"At least you are fine. I was so worried…” Mika’s voice broke for a moment making Silva feel like a worse by the moment.

"I… I wanted to help… You both helped me so much, but I am… And then I found..." Silva had no words. All she wanted to do was to help, but she had made her friend cry. “Sorry…”

“Stupid! You are a friend, you don’t have to do anything special! We won’t think any less of you!” Mika’s voice was regaining strength. “I know you wanted to help, but this issue involves Steven’s family. He will tell you in time, but it is not anything life-threatening, just… Just unpleasant. Don’t put yourself in danger.” Silva felt Mika’s embrace strengthen as did her voice.

“Sorry…” Silva repeated as she hugged her friend back. When was the last time she had seriously hugged someone? There was those brief moment she had hugged her father, but it had not felt anything like this. This embrace filled her with peace and warmth until a tickling sensation on her nose tip brought her back.

“Achoo!” Silva’s sneeze ended the silence.

"Oh, sorry!" Mika apologized as she quickly let Silva go and started to try and gather her hair back under her beanie. “Sorry, you were saying?”

Silva rubbed her nose watching the agitated girl trying to remember what they had talked about. "I… I wanted to find something illegal and call the police. It was the simplest solution I could think of, but… There was nothing. Nothing illegal, but there was… something else. I found something in their basement.” She gathered her thoughts trying to recall exactly what she had seen.

“In their basement, there was a room with only one thing in it. A small glowing blue crystal bead that was floating above the ground. It was… I can’t be sure, but... I felt stronger near it. I thought it was calling for me…” Silva looked up to the sky. “And then someone discovered that I had entered. I managed to run away. They… They did not see me.”

Mika looked straight at her. “Are you sure?”

“Yes!” Silva nodded. “It was in the deepest part of the building. I saw it clearly, it was behind the only locked door there, and the key was around the neck of their leader! There were no cameras and I no one saw me, I am sure.”

"So, how exactly did you get into that room then?" Mika narrowed her eyes and leaned closer making Silva lean backwards. "Don't tell, I don't think I want to know," Mika concluded.

“Aren't you a bit too close?” Silva asked making Mika jolt and straighten herself. “But thank you... I was… I was scared.” she mumbled.

Silva found herself in Mika’s embrace again. “It's okay, you are safe now.” She let her friend soothe her, but it did not seem like Mika was going to let go making Silva feel embarrassed.

“It’s fine now, you came and I am better now. You can let me go.” As Mika untangled herself from her Silva asked something that had on her mind. “Do you think they know? About Steven…” She probed.

“No, they shouldn’t!” Mika denied and continued. “But we will have to speak about this with Steven.”

Silva thought that she was lucky. Even when she had messed up there was someone who would listen to her and share the burden. She did think that it was unfair of her to rely so much on Mika and reaffirmed her belief that she should do something for her friends.

“It's getting colder, we should head back home.” Mika finally spoke after the prolonged tranquillity.

"Ah, yea, it is getting cold and late." Even trough the layers of clothing Silva could feel the cold bite her skin.

“What about your father?”

“Ah, he has a night shift, he is not yet home hopefully. Oh, I kind of told him that I am staying with you just in case. Sorry for that too.” Silva recalled.

"Oh, but you are," Mika stated.

“I am?”

“Yes, you are coming with me.” Mika stood up as she spoke.

“I am?”

“Yes, it is of great importance that you are not left alone after such a traumatic event.”

“It is?”

“And tomorrow there is no school, so you can get all the sleep you need at my place!”

“Huh?”

“We have a free room, so you can sleep there! I already asked my mother to prepare the bed just in case.” Mika took Silva's hand and started to forcefully pull her confused friend.