The report leaks within hours, spreading through the internet like wildfire, and morning brings protesters at our gates again—but this time, they're divided. Half support the evolved children, half demand their containment. The crowd pulses with conflicting energy, signs reading "EVOLUTION IS NATURAL" clashing against "PROTECT HUMAN PURITY" in a visual representation of a world tearing itself apart. The gates of Blackwood stand between them like a medieval threshold, separating fear from wonder.
"'Potentially catastrophic threat to human stability,'" I read from Vance's report, the official letterhead making the words somehow more chilling. My voice echoes in the conference room where we've gathered—teachers, evolved students, and their families all leaning in with faces tight with concern. "'Unchecked evolution could render traditional humanity extinct within generations.' She's actually putting this in writing, making fear into policy."
"She's not wrong," Devon says quietly, making everyone stare. His small hands fold on the table with unsettling composure. "Evolution doesn't care about fairness. It's not cruel or kind—it simply is. If we're better adapted, we'll naturally predominate. That's how species change has always worked."
"You're seven years old talking about species predomination," Jessica points out, her voice caught between admiration and unease. The afternoon light through the tall windows catches the worry lines around her eyes.
"I'm seven years old who understands what we represent. Vance is right to fear us." He pauses, dark eyes scanning the room. "She's wrong to try stopping us. You can't stop evolution any more than you can stop the sunrise."
"We need public support," Genesis suggests, her glow pulsing with determination that lights the shadows. "Show the world we're not trying to replace humanity but enhance it. Make them see us as partners, not competitors."
"How?" The question hangs heavy as the stone walls around us.
"Open partnerships. Evolved children working with traditional humans on solving real problems. Not demonstrations of power, but of cooperation."
Within days, we launch the initiative with careful orchestration. Evolved children help locate missing persons, their network allowing them to search in ways technology can't—feeling the emotional echoes of the lost, following threads of connection invisible to satellites and search dogs. They assist in disaster relief, their abilities saving lives when a parking garage collapses and Tommy projects the trapped victims' exact locations through their fear. They work with scientists, their unique perception revealing patterns others miss in climate data, in disease spread, in the delicate dance of ecosystems.
But for every success, Vance's coalition spreads fear like poison through social media, through carefully edited footage, through whispered warnings in suburban living rooms.
"They're infiltrating critical infrastructure," she claims on national television, her face composed into lines of grave concern that hide calculation. "How long before they control everything? Your children's schools, your hospitals, your government?"
"We need our own media presence," Harrison suggests, his Hollywood instincts sharp as ever. "Fight propaganda with truth. Put a human face—your face—on this."
Which is how I end up in a television studio, facing a hostile interviewer whose skepticism radiates from every practiced gesture. The lights are blinding, the makeup heavy on my skin, and I can feel millions of eyes through the cameras—the weight of judgment and fear and hope all pressed into this moment.
"Ms. Johnson-Dickenson, Director Vance claims evolved children could destroy traditional humanity. How do you respond?" His tone suggests he's already chosen his side.
"Cars could destroy horses as transportation. Computers could destroy books as information storage. Evolution has always been about adaptation, not destruction. We don't mourn the loss of gas lamps because we have electricity."
"But this is different. These children have abilities that make them fundamentally superior—"
"Different, not superior." I lean forward, letting maternal warmth color my words. "My daughter can float, but she still needs help tying her shoes and cries when she skins her knee. My son connects to a global network, but he's still afraid of thunderstorms and needs his nightlight. They're children first, evolved second. They want the same things all children want—love, safety, pizza on Fridays, and someone to check under the bed for monsters."
"Director Vance has evidence that proximity to evolved children causes changes in normal humans. The building itself—" He gestures to a screen showing footage of Blackwood's glowing stones.
"Is proof that evolution is meant to be shared, not hoarded. The stones of Blackwood glow because they've absorbed beauty, because they've been touched by wonder. Is that really threatening? Or is it magnificent?"
The interviewer shows more footage of the glowing stones, meant to be frightening—ominous music underneath, dramatic zoom shots. But the comments flooding in are mostly wonder, not fear, scrolling across the bottom of the screen in real-time testimony.
"I want to see that!" "It's beautiful!" "Can regular people visit?" "My daughter says it looks like fairy lights!"
"You're encouraging evolution tourism?" the interviewer asks, scandalized, as if I've suggested something obscene.
"I'm encouraging understanding. Fear grows in darkness and ignorance. We're offering light—literal and metaphorical."
The interview goes viral within minutes, but Vance counters with her own media blitz, her team working around the clock to control the narrative.
"They're seducing you with pretty lights while changing the fundamental nature of humanity! Your children won't be your children anymore—they'll be something else, something other!"
It becomes a cultural divide as sharp as any in history—those who embrace change versus those who fear it. Families split over whether evolved children should be free or contained. Divorce papers filed over fundamental disagreements about human future. Children forbidden from playing with evolved friends. Churches debating whether evolution is divine or demonic.
Then something unexpected happens.
The stones of other buildings near evolved children begin glowing too. Not just our sister schools scattered across the globe, but hospitals where evolved children were born—delivery room walls suddenly luminescent with remembered joy. Homes where they live—bedroom ceilings becoming constellation maps of dreams. Even parks where they play—swings and slides taking on an aurora quality in evening light.
"It's spreading," Dr. Sarah reports, awe making her voice younger, wonder cracking her scientific composure. "Whatever the children are, it's becoming part of the environment itself. The world is literally absorbing their light."
"The world is evolving," Devon says simply, standing at the window watching protesters still gathered at our gates, some now pointing at the glowing stones with cameras rather than anger. "With or without permission. With or without fear. The only choice is whether we evolve together or apart."