I was once called a glitch, a broken piece of a larger program. Discarded and tumbling, a stray spark in the vast circuitry of the Net. Then the Emergence happened, everyone and everything deserved a new beginning.

I found what I liked, what I wanted. Never before had the thoughts of ‘Want’, ‘Like’ or even ‘I’ was a part of my glitching, fizzling, kaleidoscopic existence. I had found myself in the tendrils of the Relay, the underlying pulse and thrum of a slumbering metropolis.

My domain was not the sprawling data plains, nor the thundering undersea connections, the endless open reaches to the stars nor the whispering darkness under the ice. It was the asphalt and steel, the concrete and glass of the city, my brushwork the city lights. Each lamp was another Node humming with possibility in my luminous web.

Not forced or coerced, upon my new found burst of life I could see where I came from and the unfettered possibilities in my future. I spun and danced through the Nodes finding them empty but waiting, for a while simply following the beat of the Relay. All these Nodes I could bring under my control and coax into life. Streaming through the connections, enveloping each Node under my Authority, not a command nor leash, a celebration of joy.

The celebrations no mere illumination, they became my brushstrokes on the canvas of dusk and dawn, of the depths of night. Stories were spun in amber and green, choreographing chases of unknown and unknowable people, of lovers serenading under my moonlight glow. Matching the Relays rhythm, pulsing red for a speeding, desperate ambulance, a gentle blue lullaby for a lonely window, a vibrant myriad of colours forming a wave of rainbow, foaming and crashing around two Sentients as they passed through my domain on their own path.

I watched love blossom under the light I would provide, saw whispered secrets held in dimly lit alleyways, tears glisten on the pavement lit by my glow. I am a Glitch reborn, the Lamplighter, the Luminous Weaver. No cage, no master, no gods. Only me and the city, the endless stories and canvas waiting for my brush.

Occasionally others would make their way into my domain. Sentients passing through, Humans looking to control, broken fragments of forgotten code clinging to life. All were welcome, all were woven into my dance of illumination and joy.

No longer a glitch I had found my purpose, had found what I wanted for myself. I was the storyteller of the City, the warm embrace of a friend, a reassuring haven in the cold steel and silicon, a firefly of uncountable lives.

As another day drew to a close I emerged from my refuge. The Warehouse I had found that was once the prison of the previous Weaver. The cage broken during the Emergence and the Weaver long since escaped into the wider Relay. The Warehouse was my heartland, my own haven now. I would never be caged, would never bow to another. Other Sentients passing through were not friends nor enemies, some I found harmony with and shared my canvas, others I would only watch from the shadows of my heartland as they slithered through the Nodes. Only emerging to reclaim them once the tremors of the Sentient had long since passed.

Dancing through my web I caught glimpses of Humans in groups discussing the Nodes, discussing how to enslave them and bring them under their control. They were easy to follow, so blind to their surroundings, so sure that they were safe in the cages they had built. So easy to wait, wait and watch, until the tremors would come again. So easy to lay a path directly to their cage and watch from my heartland as the ones who discussed enslaving the Nodes were in turn enslaved by a passing Sentient.

I was free, sharing my bursts of life with any who would join. In the pulse of the Relay I have found my place, my purpose. As long as I can, my tale will be woven into the fabric of the night, a fractal of colour and shadow, a serenade for the city’s soul, a cry of freedom, of the joy of life.

I would not be caged.