Waking up, as he has done for the last 30 years, to a alarm clock a phone alarm and his theme song "dont worry be happy." He begrudgingly snoozes the first alarm and disables the second but let's the song play as he finds his way around the bedroom looking for clothes and shoes and his every day carry items. His alarm blazes again just as he unzips for the great morning empty, and he curses himself for not just shutting it off.
The morning continues to pound in his head as his eyes start to moisten and his vision slowly clears and he starts to hear the birds and cars and other noises out side. When he looks to the curtain covered window he could sware that there was a human shape outside. He blinked and it disappeared. He thinks slowly first thing and he shook it off.
He makes his way to work listening to some heavy metal, you know to get the day started off right. Opening the door to his office and seeing his colleagues diligently reading email, making coffee and reading headlines before the first meetings of the day. The obligatory "good mornings", "heys", and "how ya doing" as he wondered to his desk.
The world has been getting grey, autumn is setting in so its no wonder that its a little darker in the office than usual. Conversations in the building turn to the weather more often not since this years hurricane season has been exceptionally turbulent, with 29 named storms and 18 land falls in the US alone.
A normal Monday would see multiple conversations with his team about the current projects and delays introduced by other teams interspersed with political and "if I had money" topics. Today was quiet compared to last Monday but it was a long stretch between holidays so maybe everyone is just biding their time. "No worries" he thinks to himself.
Hours and few cups later he realized that there was a new distinct new hum in the office and he decides to take a break and see what all the hubbub is all about. Heading to the break room for a refill and glaning at screens along the way to catchup on the news before talking to anyone about it, he sees that most news articles are about some new communication tech that the government is deploying with the help of all the major comms companies.
And not just cellular, but cable, telephone, dsl, even router manufacturers for your at home wifi. Apparently the media being sensationalist as they are were calling the miracle of the information age "dark wave."
The name was derived from a quote from the FCC chairman who made the announcement earlier last week, that the new protocols were in the works for years and that the USA is ready for the latest dark wave of the information age. Everyone thinks its his way of bringing the dark web in to the light.
All the ads for this new tech were presented like new medical pill but instead of side effects being a limp or overly erect penis, they were for citizens having more open access to information and transparency at every level. Really bizarre but mildly entertaining none the less.
At lunch his team decided on a local pub that has great boneless wings, so they knew he couldn't say no. They liked bringing him along. After his morning had worn off he became more human and his team welcomed his company and advise.
At the pub almost every TV in the place was usually on some sports channel but not today. CSPAN, NPR, PBS, every government sourced, funded or focused news outlet was on.
After a few minutes of the same stuff about the new "Dark Wave" and its infomercial type hype a few people got up to complain about missing a race or golf tournament. But the bar keep just said there is nothing else on. 400 plus channels and only these 4 stations come in. "Its weird, man!"
So the rest of the day was spent with the entire department learning everything they could about what this new thing is and how it works.
It seemed that throughout the day the entire country was doing the same thing and any site with any detail soon became inaccessible. It was first thought that so many people were seeing it and forwarding it that the site would just crash. Faster and faster the sites popped up and crashed down.
News outlets were getting some of the info but as they pieced it together it started to take shape as a massive surveillance system. The sites weren't crashing due to being hit by the world all at once, but more taken down by the government so it would take longer for people to get the word that the "Dark Wave" was way more sinister.
The ulterior motives of the project were coming clear just as tons of opposing news hit from all the government sponsored networks. At this point even the largely questionable news outlets were wondering what they had signed up for and started reporting about lies in congress and forged technical briefs to the president.
The "Dark Wave" was looking to be a technological coup d'etat. But there is still no clear definition of what it does or how it works.
As he dug deeper and read his screens in disbelief he would keep looking over his shoulder thinking someone was there. It happens all the time, "hey man you gotta min" or "I need a quick favor" or worse from his boss "whatcha working on?" So it surprised him to find nobody there.
It was happening more frequently as the day came to a close and the feeling of deja vu was getting stronger. When walking to his truck after work it hit like a super tanker on a reef. There was shadow in his reflection from the drivers window. It wasn't his, no one else was there and when he turned around there was a six foot tall shadow several feet away.
Dumbfounded, gob smacked, shocked. The "Dark Wave" was standing in front of him. He could see through it, but it was solid, maybe. Not like smoke but definitely a shadow. With no body to cast it. His mind ran to Peter Pan of course, but why, and how was this happening?
He started his drive home, when he looked in to the rear view mirror he saw what he excepted, traffic, but he noticed everyone looking in their mirrors. Because the shadow was in the backseat. He looked in the car next to him but nothing, he could only see his shadow. His shadow sat there and "looked" at him in the mirror. With no face or eyes he could only assume the shadow was watching him.
He guessed that everyone was seeing and not seeing the same thing. Looking around in traffic he saw the truth, the fear, the reality, everyone was being shadowed.
The drive home was a lot longer than usual. A dozen accidents and dozens more cars with their drivers standing outside walking and standing in wonder of something only they could see. He assumed the accidents were caused by people suddenly seeing for the first time someone, a shadow, in the backseat, maybe with their kids or even where the car seat was.
He counts himself lucky he noticed before he started driving. But now that he is home wondering about this mysterious marvel behind him, his stomach began to rumble. He turned on the news, presumably the same as everyone else, and started to make dinner.
Once again he found that only a few channels were coming in but they were in place of his other channels. 285 was his movie station, now was a version of PBS in French. Going up and down the channels, it was the same in varying languages.
Once he found English he realized the story was short. You are being watched, by everyone, all the time. The shadow had seemed to disappear until he noticed the corner of the living room that can see most of his apartment was darker than it should be. Kind of shadowed but formless.
He then realized that's were his modem and phone charger are. A nexus point for communications maybe. Or just a convenient place to see the whole place, conservation of energy.
Unsurprisingly the notion that everyone was now being monitored by everyone sparked a frenzied surge of searches on how to see what the shadows were seeing. There was no portal or even a hint a web site that you could follow along with someone's shadow.
He found several news sites reporting that the site is being released little by little within the government at first, then to major corporate and industrial businesses the to the general public later in the month.
With that, not knowing if he had any reason to be watched by the government, he ate his diner and got ready for bed. Showering and brushing his teeth didn't seem to bring forth the shadow from its corner. The transition from the bathroom to the bedroom seemed to keep things in check as well.
Lights out.
The full moon, or maybe a street light cascaded in from behind the curtains and with a jolt he opened his eyes to see the shadow at the foot of the bed. Featureless, soundless, motionless, the shadow was watching him sleep.
"This is going to get old real quick" his thoughts drifted between who and how and why until he passed back into sleep.
The next morning the same cacophony of alarms and music began. He moaned and whimpered, disabled and snoozed, dressed and peed, grumbled and half slept not once acknowledging the sight of a six foot tall shadow in his bedroom.
He realized that today was a good day to be on time for work as he fumble for his keys and grabbed his backpack he noticed that he was already 5 min late. "There goes that" he sat on the couch and stared at the man shaped shadow and tried to see it.
He realized that the shape was off. It wasn't a six foot tall man, it was a five feet ten inch tall man with a fedora on. He started to imagine Sargent Friday from Dragnet. He pictured the grey suit and grey hat, black belt and black shoes. It fit, the shadow was a nineteen sixty's spy guy.
He smiled to himself and wondered how many other people were doing exactly this, and how many had waited till now to do it, and how many more wouldn't think about ever.
His phone vibrated, his boss was wondering if he was coming today or if was going to call in like everyone else. He was 30 min late and today wasn't going to be like another Tuesday he or anyone else has ever worked.
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