Murderers of light

At 11:30 pm, June 6, 2016 Manila. Late night shows were suddenly interrupted by a breaking news that also hit the media globally. It was one of those rare occasions where people from around the world glued to their television sets like that of the Apollo landing on the moon or that of the September 11 terrorist attack.

"What is this?" Ilaw [EEL-aw] thought as his internet surfing was suddenly interrupted by a pop-up window. The video showed the sun filtered by some technology which made it appear dark orange. Its surface had those usual dark circular regions which widely pigmented the sun and those huge golden circles which release huge pillars of fire into space.

Ilaw clicked on the cancel button but the video won't go away. He notices the "Live" icon appearing on the top right of the screen. It was followed by the logo of CNN appearing on the lower left corner. A text began running right above the news channel's logo indicating the video as live feed from NASA.

A small video insert right above the text showed up. In it was Barrack Obama with high-ranking officials from the military and scientific institutions right behind him.

"I want the whole world to know that what you are about to see is very real. We are coming to you live because I trust that the whole world can handle this with so much maturity and wisdom. Our reaction to what we are about to see must be guided by years of progress. We must do away with rash decisions and mass hysteria for we are better than any civilizations in the past. Let us see what we will see and decide what we are going to do after as one intelligent human community. I hope we agree on that," the leader said from behind a podium bearing the American president seal.

Ilaw was not convinced with what he was hearing. He unplugged his black laptop from its charger, shut the lid, carried it with his right hand and ran downstairs towards the living room television set. He placed his laptop on the low wooden table then swiped the remote so he could switch the channel to CNN. The same video he had seen a while ago on his computer was airing.

The sun's image was still dead center of the screen then suddenly coming from the mid-right of the screen was a silvery oval object, the size and shape of a barley grain, with three or four tiny circular specks following behind it. As they moved in supersonic speed around the sun, flashes of light emanated from the disk hitting the sun's surface creating huge ripples of gasses which dissipated as they moved further.

"NASA had seen this craft, 11 hours ago and it had been behaving like this ever since. Currently, we do not have any idea what this thing is doing. We do know, however, that we are not the target of this unidentified vehicle. We are not in any danger whatsoever," Obama explained.

"Nay! Nay! Dali gud," Ilaw yelled for his mom to get up and out of her room, which was adjacent to the parlor. The video flickered. "Nay!" he ran towards her door, knocked loudly.

His mom woke up cursing at the disturbance. Ilaw was a bit scared at what he had done, but he felt that the most senior in the house ought to know what was happening.

"Ano man?!" she came out the door her curly hair extra unruly, brows furrowed, forehead marred by deep wrinkles, eyes squinting from the light coming from the living room while tying the belt of her red bathrobe around her waist.

Ilaw explained as briefly as he could what was on television. "There could be an alien craft at the sun," he said.

His mom walked beside him, silent, probably digesting what she heard and partly brushing off such nonsense. She had always thought that her thin-framed geeky son with a soft-speaking voice had always been fascinated by science and controversial topics like UFOs, and he can definitely be easily persuaded into believing hoaxes.

She grabbed her brown horn-rimmed glasses from the living room table, wore it then remained silent while taking in everything that was airing on CNN.

"That looks like some dust or probably some space shuttle debris," she said.

Ilaw laughed at her comment. "You are in denial, Nay. Obama and NASA said that it is an unidentified craft. Secondly, no man-made vehicle could fly that close to the sun."

The screen suddenly went black.

His mom gestured with an open palm at the TV, "What happened?"

Ilaw shrugged his shoulders then hurriedly switched to the local channels. It was also black, but voices of news anchors can be heard. They also sounded surprised at why the video feed stopped. They appeared on screen seconds later then began recapping what they'd just broadcasted.

Ilaw's mom whined at how insignificant that news was then started walking away towards the kitchen. She kept murmuring her disapproval of such journalists who make a big fuss out of trifles. She reached for a mug then brewed herself some hot cocoa on the coffee maker.

Ilaw remained motionless by the television watching the two news anchors. A phone rang loudly. It was Jessica Soho's phone. Her partner looked at her scornfully for carrying a phone while they were on air. She apologized, took out the phone from her pocket, looked at the display, and mentioned that it was Susan, their New York correspondent, calling.

Jessica answered the call. Her face wrinkled.

"I couldn't understand what you are saying. Could you say that again slowly this time?" Jessica pleaded. "Oh, my! Yes, I am on air right now. I will put you on loudspeaker, okay? I want you to give us your report."

Jessica asked the sound engineer to lower the boom microphone so that it would pick up the caller's voice.

"You are now live, Susan," Jessica said.

"The whole United States has blacked out, Jessica. Literally we are in the dark now."

"What do you mean? Doesn't America have huge power surplus?"

"It's not that kind, Jessica. The sun is out. The sun has blacked out. There is no sun here." her voice trembling.

The television went dead and so did all the lights in the house. No light came through the living room window drapes which meant the street lamps were also out.

"Nay!" Ilaw yelled.


Note:  This story will be developed further in the future.