The strongest piece in this issue… a supple, intriguing tale.

Jeff Verona, Tangent Online

On Saturday, May 24th, at 11:14AM, the lights went out, and remained out for a period of seventeen minutes and forty-one seconds. The darkness lasted long enough for irritation to become first concern and then panic. People went into hysterics; they sobbed, prayed loudly, made sudden declarations of love.

When the lights came on again, eleven people were dead, and the living avoided one another’s eyes in embarrassment. Among the dead were three suicides, six heart attacks, one industrial accident — and, the coroner later determined, one murder.