"Tonight is a night of the Dark at its most encompassing," Father Sair said to those assembled.

The room itself was dark; the only light was from the great bowl of holographic fire. It was not the real thing; it added no real heat, and it did not burn anything. The ash from a real blaze was a true part of this, the sacred turning of a mundane thing to black; returning it to the Dark.

In the flickering light sat a half circle of people, watching him. There were seven of them, and his cabin was a small one, meant for a single person. The intimacy helped, however.

"Despite the difficulties we face, and the oppression we must overcome, we have found each other," he continued.

Cassandra gazed at him with a filial adoration. Iago with a gratitude that he knew would never fade. Their son was uninterested, only there because of his parents, but he knew one day that would change and he would be a true believer.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Three others watched with the conviction of the freshly converted.

And last, Alexander Shaw, who was still uncertain. But he was receptive.

"Though others may feel false safety and amusement in their childish excitements today, we know the truth; that we are just tiny sparks in an infinite darkness. We will fade with time. But it is in knowing our place within the cosmos that we become one with it."

He put his hands over the flames. They shrunk, dying. There was no pain as he had felt so many times before when doing this over a real flame.

But he would make do.

"They laugh at us for our faith. They oppress us with their regulations and then make a pretense of fairness. But their arrogance, their faithlessness will still their lips one day. We need only keep our faith my brothers and sisters."

He lifted his hands, so used to seeing them blistered, bleeding and cracked from the flames. But they still shook, with the human flaw of memory; remembering burning flames of the past that had left his hands at One with the Dark.

He lifted his eyes, met each of theirs.

"We still have further to go. Hold onto your minds as you sink deeper into the Dark. We will sink, we will fade, but we are saved, for we know we are Small."