ELECTROMASTERS CANNOT TECHNICALLY shoot electricity. Electricity is not a projectile. Electricity is simply the flow of electrons from an area of high electrical potential to an area of low electrical potential. Imagine a ball rolling down a hill. When the ball reaches the ground, how fast it's ultimately travelling depends on the height it descended from. A ball dropped from a skyscraper will have much greater velocity than a ball dropped from a ten-foot ladder when it hits the ground. In classical electromagnetism, the ball is an electron, and the height is voltage. The greater the voltage gap an electron traverses, the more energy it'll have.

Unlike the ball however, an electron cannot be projected at a distant target. The main reason is that air is not a good conductor of electricity. However, if a large enough potential difference (and charge imbalance) exists between the source of electricity and the target, the electrons will "leap" to the area of low potential in an electrostatic discharge. This is the principle behind lightning.

The challenge is to create the potential difference for the electrons to flow through. This is where dark energy comes in. Electromasters use dark energy as a power source to generate an area of low electrical potential at a distant target. When this potential difference exists, the laws of physics can take care of the rest. Electrons will naturally flow to the area of low electrical potential (overcoming any insulators) and deposit their excess energy on their target in an electrostatic discharge.

Although dark energy is integral in wielding esper-related abilities, how it actually works is still a mystery. Labs all over the world are currently researching dark energy in hopes of harnessing it to solve the global energy crisis.

FEBRUARY MARKED THE end of the coldest part of winter. The skies were still grey, but longer days and shorter nights had softened the snow and thawed the ice. Meltwater trickled through the gutters and eventually ended up in the reservoirs in District 21. The prospect of an early growing season appealed to the seedlings that had yet to germinate from the sated soil. Mercury in the thermometers that hung in windows bobbed above and below the red line at 0ºC and foreshadowed an imminent end to the cold snap that struck the Tokyo region just days before.

A light drizzle fell on Academy City today and washed away the dirty layer of snow that had accumulated on the sidewalks. Even though it was wet, Greater Academy City was as busy as ever. Seen from above, the umbrellas looked like beads that jiggled and joggled by each other in harried motions. The raindrops clapped on the nylon like drums and produced a steady pattering that filled the streets.

Dante sat with his back against a restaurant dumpster and let the drizzle run down his face. These alleys branched through all of downtown Academy City, and they all smelled like rotting meat. Every one of them. And it became near unbearable when it was raining. At least the snow covered up some of the smell; the water marinated the garbage and spawned a scent as putrid as a septic tank. Dante hugged himself and breathed into his shirt to filter the smell. He rolled down his eyes and tried to drift into an impossible sleep.

Thoughts of his mother danced in his head, her staunch face and old hands eroded by age and activity. She carried 60 years of experience in a 30 year old's body. She spoke in adages and worked in solitude. She waited for him every day in the same room with the same red bowl full of the same oatmeal and cinnamon that he would gobble up without grace. He never did get to thank her for that. She made him write a 500 character essay every day of the week. He initially hated her for that, but grew to accept it and then to embrace it. It was only a week ago that he learned from Virgil that his mother never learned how to read or write.

He remembered his father and his devilish yet comforting smile, the one that all fathers seem to have perfected. He was a world class liar when it came to explaining things. The first movie Dante ever saw was It's a Wonderful Life, and his father made him believe that a live action movie was merely a really well-drawn animation. He told him that the sun was a cherry and the moon, a grape, but also the real explanation behind some things. After all, the most convincing lies have a grain of truth in them.

Lastly, he recalled his two older brothers, both of whom called him Dan-chan, a name that he hated. They teased him like old brothers should, but they stood up for him like old brothers should. Dante had barely begun to love them before they died.

A stream of rain struck his head, and he jolted back to attention. It hurt.

It felt like the single droplet of water split open his skull and continued to drill its way down his brain. His jaw went numb. Dante clenched his eyes shut. The pain radiated through his neck and into his chest. Here it goes again. The fire sizzled down his sides and reached his feet. Flakes of skin peeled off and disappeared. The rain minced his flesh and bore through his bone. Decades ago, physicians described a condition called cluster headaches. Onset of the headaches is rapid, and they may last from minutes up to hours. Patients describe the sensation as having a red-hot poker shoved through their eyes and through the top of their craniums. The condition is also called "suicide headaches", because so many of the sufferers kill themselves. Investigators who studied this condition wrote that a cluster headache was the worst pain that a human could feel; worse than passing a kidney stone, worse than giving birth. They must not have known about Dante's condition.

Then the pain dissolved. Odd. The scorching sensation receded back to Dante's head and then vanished in a single point on his nose. He breathed in short rasps as he regained his senses. He eased his eyes ajar and wiped off the coat of sweat and rain that slicked his eyelids. The scent of dirty fur entered his nose before he saw the tongue against his face. The bright spots of light cleared from his vision, and a German shepherd sat before him.

"Oh, Cerberus."

The dog licked his chops and leaned in. Dante placed his hand between the dog's ears and scratched his head. He was shivering. Water ran down his saturated fur and merged into a small stream on the concrete. Lightning flashed and thunder followed.

Dante peeled off his coat and wrapped it around the dog, who shuddered as the cold moisture pressed against his skin.

"I had a feeling you'd find me, so I got this for you," he said as he pulled a package wrapped in paper from his pocket. "Take it as a thank you gift."

Cerberus's head perked up as Dante unwrapped a steak and threw it on the ground. The dog sniffed it and then began to chew on it slowly as to savor the taste. Dante squatted beside him to watch. Cerberus casually glanced up at him and then resumed eating.

"So how's the steak?" asked Dante. The Alsatian ignored him.

"Good. I was hoping you'd say that."

Dante whisked his hair back and settled cross-legged on the ground. Dark circles of moisture dotted his grey undershirt.

"I once watched a movie with my dad. It was an old, black-and-white picture about a detective trying to solve a mystery. You know, your typical noir film. In one part, the detective says something like, 'If I ever catch him, I'll make sure he gets a death sentence.' I'd never heard of a death sentence before, so I asked my father what it was. He said that it was a sentence that an executioner whispered to a criminal to kill him. Then I asked him if he knew what the words were, and he said that he did, and that if I ever misbehaved, he would whisper it to me in my sleep. Shit, I was so scared after that, and he knew it. He assigned me a ton of chores, and I did them. It was either comply or die. Hah! That bastard! After two weeks, I went up to him as he was watching TV and asked him if he was really going to kill me if I misbehaved. My mom overheard from the other side of the room and asked me what the hell was going on. I explained, and they both had a good laugh. My dad told me that he made everything up. And hell, I was more relieved than angry."

Cerberus continued to nibble at the meat. The rain grew colder and heavier. Dante ionized the air around him to keep warm.

"After that, I trusted my mom. She was my sieve for the bullshit that my dad spewed out. The death sentence incident proved that she wasn't a liar. So a few months later when she confirmed that Santa Claus existed, I was totally convinced. I remember I only wanted a few science textbooks that year and never getting them. Must've broken their hearts when they saw it and realized they wouldn't be able to afford them.

"You know how I figured out there was no Santa Claus? I saw the Christmas commercials on TV. He'd always slide down the chimney, eat the cookies, drink the milk, fill the stocking, and then leave an assload of gifts under the Christmas tree. Took his sweet time. And all the while, I was yelling, 'Go faster, old man! You've got other children waiting for you!' Then I realized that no way in hell was he going to make it to every kid in just one night. I even did the calculations. Santa's payload would've weighed around 350,000 tons, and he would've needed a quarter million reindeer to pull it all. Then I figured out that if was going to drop off gifts at every house, he'd need to travel at ten times the speed of sound. With that speed and mass, he'd experience 14 quintillion joules of energy per inch per second. That's like having 250,000 Hiroshima bombs going off in every nook and cranny of his body. Not kidding."

Cerberus glanced up, snorted, and then went back to his now half-eaten steak.

"By the time I started high school, I thought I had my parents' tricks all sorted out. But now I realize they had one last great lie for me to debunk, and it's this: that if I believed in myself, my vision, my principles, that if I had perseverance, I would be destined for greatness. Everything would work out in the end.

"What a joke. It was the biggest lie, and it took me the longest to figure out. Mother always told me that if I wanted to be a politician, I'd become the president; if I wanted to be a businessman, I'd become a CEO. Well, I wanted to be an esper. So I studied and trained, drank sweat and pissed blood, and look where I am now."

Dante craned his neck upward and watched the rain pelt his skin and evaporate instantly from the energy field. Cerberus swallowed the last bit of the meat and licked his gums. Dante extended a hand and stroked his head.

"But this isn't so bad, is it?"

Dante rose up and rubbed a crick that had developed on the back of his neck. He uncoiled the coat from the dog's body and slipped it back on himself. It smelled terrible but still better than the garbage.

"C'mon, boy. I'll drop you off back home. It's a short walk."

Cerberus thrashed off the loose pockets of water in his fur and followed Dante along the torturous back alleys. The ground grew grimier in a morose gradient as they neared The Strange. The first rain of the season had washed forth all the filth that had been locked away in the snow and soil, in District 10, that is. The rest of Academy City was pristine. Cleaning robots scooted around all day, literally, all day to scrub, sweep, and sanitize. It was one big cleanroom.

The familiar welcome signs of District 10 took the form of faded graffiti and dilapidated buildings. Patches of dead, strawy grass ran along the base of a chain link fence that had long been cut open. They were getting their first glimpses of the sky after a long but expected winter.

Dante rounded the corner where a run-down convenience store sulked in its better memories. In front of an apartment, he saw four men in blue uniforms and transparent ponchos next to an ambulance. Dante paused in his tracks and slid back around the corner. One of the men lit a cigarette and took a drag. Another guffawed at some unheard joke that was scattered in the sheets of rain coming down. He waited. After a while, the four of them turned to their heads at the same time. Two EMTs carried a body bag on a stretcher out of the doors and loaded it into the back of the vehicle. Dante's eyes widened, and his jaw fell slack. Cerberus looked at him curiously and whimpered. He seemed to know just as well as Dante that Virgil was dead. They had been looking for him, but instead, they found only an old man reading a book. They must've interrogated him, and through the thick film of mucus and tar in his lungs, he gurgled out a string of negative responses. He probably sat in his antique chair and smiled as Anti-Skill decided what to do with him. One of them probably unholstered his sidearm and threatened Virgil one more time before he gave the final "no". One shot to the head was probably all it took. He slumped back, and his arms plopped soundlessly on the table. The book was opened three-quarters of the way. That was the biggest tragedy; Virgil never got to finish what he started. Not the book, not his bar, not his life.

Dante turned to Cerberus and sighed. Virgil wouldn't have wanted him to pity him, so he didn't. But he couldn't help thinking how much of a damned shame it was.

Rain fell, lightning flashed, thunder followed.

"It's getting dark now," he said to Cerberus.

The dog nodded as if to agree, but it was only a consequence of his head oscillating up and down with his breaths. Dante scratched him on the head once more and walked towards the direction from whence they came. His body felt airy and spry, as if gravity itself had lightened. Cerberus watched as he disappeared past the beaded wall of water. The dog couldn't decide whether to stay or to follow.

Not far away, the engine of the ambulance purred to life, and the sound of rubber tires grinding on loose asphalt signaled Virgil's first departure from District 10 in five years. The rain showed no signs of letting up.

He decided to follow.