Phone vandalism throughout the city has surged to levels half again as much as in previous years.

Regional Bell officials are at a loss to explain the reason for the upsurge, although speculation abounds. Theories include a protest reaction to rising calling rates, economic stress causing outbursts of anarchy, and, - most conspiratorial - an effort to force people to purchase mobile phones, and drive up sales for telecom providers.

City officials have responded with surveillance spot checks and a rotation of spy cams trained on oft-afflicted phones. So far no vandals have been caught.

Damage is often sophisticated, involving electronic hacking rather than obvious physical vandalism. Police say this lends credit to the theory the damage represents an organized effort, rather than a trend of random acts. Citizens are urged to report damage immediately, noting time and who may be around. Experts say the vandals may linger to observe the frustration they cause, much like arsonists often inhabit the crowd around the fire they've set.

"This is more serious than you know," offered one young woman who gave her name only as Azure, one of numerous person-on-the-street interviews Sentinel Staff conducted. "People depend on these phones to get home. It can be very dangerous to be prevented from going home. To both mind and to body."

"I got my cell phone," said William Eastland, a human

Please See Vandalism on A2

You see them all over the city: electronic accessories, and sometimes clothing, with small, red telltale lights. They're on PDAs. On cellphones. On laptops, MP3 players, radios, eyeglasses,belts.

At night, our streets swarm with crimson fireflies.

"It's caught on with the button-down crowd," City fashion fashion website webmistress Melanie Vranakalovich said. "It's unusual, since the club scene is usually the origin of new fashion trends, such as the leather duster/fedora craze that's still going strong. But the red lights have bypassed the usual hipster contingent completely."

Charcoal-suited businessmen favor the look, often with the slightly cool touch of dark glasses, worn even during the day. We asked two such men, who declined to identify themselves, about the red-LED accessories. "The better to see you with," said one. "Now go back to your dreamy little life, citizen, and stay warm," said the other.>/p>

Cryptic is the new repartee style, we guess.

Club denizens take a different view. They view the red-LED types ("LEDdites," they are sometimes called, or "LED agents") with wariness. One muscled hipster, who goes by the handle ToughLucky, put it bluntly: "we're expected to get along, but those are bad dudes. Stay out of their way. They're hard enough to handle even with the latest downloads. You blue - " (he hesitated, here) "You civilians don't stand a chance. Say, do you ever feel all this is some kind of lie?" This last is an expression of another popular trend in the city: a quasi-religious movement which maintains reality is an illusion, and promotes worship of - or, as adherents are quick to qualify - gratitude to "the One ."

Please See Glowing Red on A2