Come Over to the Dark Side." "Hoping to join the Dark Empire? This ain't the Dark Side." "This is the Dark Side," I replied. "We're not like them," I said. "We're not like the Haterz." He wasn't listening. The man was shaking his head. "The Haterz think of you as their way to get the power they feel they deserve." "I want to help." "The Haterz are evil. They're out to bring harm. They know the secret to power." "So?" "Your friends do," he said, and pointed at me. "My friends? The Haterz?" I said, incredulous. "They had us in a house-to-house gunfight! And you're worried about me joining them?" The old man's jaw dropped. He looked to his daughter for a sign. She was shrugging, but she was smiling. "You had your guns drawn, so you were ready to shoot?" I said. "What if some innocent kid was in there?" "You still haven't answered me," he said. "Would you join?" "The Dark Empire? Why, hell, no!" I said, and then paused. "Why, hell, yes," I said. "I would." He cocked his head, looked out his window at the street. "You see this whole area as the Dark Side?" "Mostly." "If you look at it right, it's the biggest experiment ever," he said, grinning. "Ever since the Big Crash, the whole region has been up for grabs. You see how our lives have been ruined with poverty and pollution. There are some people who live on the dark side of reality and it suits them fine. We've tried democracy, and it's been a failure. So now we have this new chance, this second chance at creating a Utopia, of building a world that's entirely free from poverty, crime, pollution, and, uh, evil." "I hear you," I said. "They're not all bad." "This ain't the Dark Side. My friends are good people, but we all live on the Dark Side now." "Where I come from," I said, "dark doesn't mean bad. It means dark skies. What we're talking about here is a way to get to the side of the sun." "Then you're not an apologist." "My god, no. Me, I'm a realist." "A realist?" I shrugged. "I know where the Dark Side is, that's all." The old man leaned toward me in the seat. "You'll see the Dark Side when the dark one is done. I see it now. I see his shadow on the wall." We drove around for a while. "I see the Dark Side," the old man said. "But we're not talking about a dark side of reality. We're talking about a dark side of everything." He was telling me that he saw God at work. "They've been telling you lies all along. That you're going to hell. But the dark one has already come for you. And he's given you another chance." We pulled into a vacant lot next to the highway, then stopped a hundred feet up the road. A sign was nailed to a telephone pole. It was printed on white cardboard, written by hand: DARK SIDE OF MISSION. THE LITTLE MAN WAS HERE. The old man and his daughter stayed in the car as I walked up the road to the billboard. I've never had a problem with a religious argument. I like them. It's how they're done. A lot of people have trouble with a person of faith. They're supposed to believe God exists and then believe in their hearts that they know what He wants them to do with their lives. They have to believe what they're supposed to believe, and then believe that they should. It's not that easy. The truth is, if the guy I knew about in the story had believed in the Devil, I would have believed in him too. I've also never had a problem with the concept of redemption. We all get a second chance. That's why we call it a second chance. It's also why the guy in the story had to change. He had to see that his whole way of life was based on a lie, and when he figured that out, he couldn't just stay the same. The thing I couldn't get past was the idea of a godless world. I couldn't accept that there were forces greater than the Devil, greater than human desire. The Devil and the Dark Side of reality were the same thing to the old man. But I wasn't like him. I never saw evil as something good, or power as something evil, and so I always saw things differently. I have met many people with different beliefs. As long as they didn't try to make me adopt their beliefs, I had nothing against it. People have their beliefs, that's the reason they believe. The problem was that my beliefs were always about people. I see a billboard like the one in the story, and I always think of the girl who painted it. I think about her and her dad sitting in front of the television in their little house on a tiny island and watching these billboards all over the place. She must have felt this weird pull to the Dark Side. I'm not saying it was bad to be a Dark Empire sympathizer in that area; we're talking about a fantasy, a belief that is about a world she hoped would come true. You can't look at it that way and then judge people. I walked back to the car and the old man had this look on his face. He was proud that I took his side, but I could tell he had no idea who I was or why I was going with him. He had an idea, but he was guessing. "Come with me," he said, patting the seat next to him. "I'll show you the Dark Side." "Where?" "Down the road a little bit," he said. We drove a little while and then parked at the corner of a street. "Right there is the darkest thing I've ever seen," he said. "And it's about to grow." "So you're not sure if I should join you?" "There's a bunch of guys already there. We're calling ourselves the Dark Side Militia. It was something they wanted to do. They just liked the sound of it." "You've already got some Dark Side regulars." "How did you know that?" he said. "You're sitting in front of a billboard that says Dark Side Militia. You just figured out what to call yourselves?" "We just liked it," he said. "You call yourselves the fucking Dark Side Militia." "They ain't called themselves that yet. We only just got together. But I knew you were a skeptic, so I had to make sure you could relate." "Don't the Haterz have a military thing going?" I said. "You ain't the only one with a military thing going," he said. I waited for him to explain. "We're the Resistance," he said. "The Resistance?" "We can't say too much about that right now. We can't do much more than get it off our chests. But I already know the Resistance will grow to be a power to be reckoned with. We'll need soldiers, officers, and even our own generals, but we'll need warriors first." "You're talking about guerrilla war?" "We are not guerrillas," he said, leaning forward in his seat. "We don't fight against a nation, we fight against darkness. That's why you're gonna help us with the recruiting." "So the army won't be joining this Resistance of yours." "The army is too soft. If we're going to win, it'll have to be like one big rebellion." "Revolution," the girl said, smiling. "Exactly," the old man said. "But I can't lead it. I'm old and I know it. I have a lot to give, but not enough. You look at me and you see a grandfather. I was forty-seven when the Big Crash hit. I was trying to make money to retire when the world went sour." "How old are you now?" I said. "I'm fifty-two," he said. "And I feel old, but I'm strong." "I didn't know you had kids." He was suddenly uncomfortable. "I don't," he said. "She's mine. We're from the same county." I didn't care, and he knew it. The girl wasn't looking at me either, so I looked out the window and she laughed softly. "We're called the Resistance because