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by Joshua Allen
how he'd wound up on such a road. Things had been going smoothly
place to pee and now he'd been going down this road for two
gas station.
with a prefab metal building stuck in it, not realizing what the
attention. The man was old, occupied with the Omaha newspaper
and lording over his domain, which included the dust, a few
out onto the counter. Recounted it before the old man covered it
of his money. "So, the highway's just back that way?" Spec
"Nah."
when, after three hours, he had yet to reach it. Then he started
thinking he'd really started out the other way and had been
interstate or the fuel station with the strange old man the rest
tried to ask the man where he was, framing it as a joke, and got
no response. When he asked where the nearest town was, the old
man responded, "Just down the road a stretch." Later that day a
similar gas station yielded similar results but still there was
no town in sight.
to prove wrong, Spec realized there was something wrong with the
knowns, the givens. Spec worked with truth for a living and
truth was merely a set of known factors to which one applied the
knew this, and yet when he applied the rules of logic to what he
their life spans, his conclusion that there must be a way off
It was the end of day 2 and Spec was curled up in the back
seat of his Saturn on the side of the road. He was already tired
them how long he'd been driving without seeing anything. Some of
them laughed like it was all a big joke. He was starting to feel
that it was a big joke, and this feeling was overridden by the
feeling that he was sick of the joke and wanted it to end so he
show where they were drugging him every few miles, turning his
car around, and waking him up again. Maybe the service station
was the same one every time, only the guy behind the counter was
different. Maybe he was dead and this was hell. Spec found it
difficult to sleep. Not only was the back seat of the Saturn not
designed for horizontal comfort, but also the faces of all those
of those old men down and shaking him until he got some answers.
sense. Maybe aliens had kidnapped him and this was a cruel
experiment.
Spec did manage to catch a few winks before the sun came
travel. He pushed open the back door of his car and stepped out
traveling, just wait at the roadside with his hood open, the
motorist to take pity on him and drive him to the nearest town.
Maybe his car was some sort of brainwashing machine sold to him
assassin and this was all just memory implants while the real
the day. This day he didn't see so much as a gas station. When
that he would drive until the car quit and then he would start
walking. The car died a few hours later and, true to his
promise, he grabbed his jacket from the trunk, and began walking
down the highway's shoulder into the night. It didn't take long
for his car to disappear from his sight completely. When it did,
some evil burden. This thought led him back to the idea that
whatever was happening to him, his car was somehow to blame and
now that he was free of it, his situation would only improve.
The dark was wearing thin; he had to bat his eyes to combat
the dark spots that had begun to betray his vision. Things were
the grass. When the sun finally emerged on the horizon, it gave
few minutes, he felt that he would be able to walk the whole day
through. The sun's powering light faded quickly and Spec found
himself lying in the field near the road using his jacket
closer. In the night air, the passing marks on the road started
until he realized that the green of the road markers was getting
His watch told him that dawn was approaching soon. He scanned
the horizon and the glow of what he hoped was a nearing city had
indeed faded, some. The sky was going from black to navy blue.
to shield his eyes from the coming sun, he locked his eyes on
the road with his jacket over his head his hands tucked under
his stomach. His watch told him that he'd just missed the
salt deposits out of his eyes and did some basic Yoga stretches.
the next day, if he had yet to reach the town--he was positive
it was a town in front of him. He stood, did a few more
stretches, and began walking. His feet felt like they had rested
blisters were no longer pricking the balls and toes of his feet.
daylight, since the lights were even brighter now. Not only the
centerline, but also the edge lines of the highway were all
glowing bright green. He began walking down the road lane, his
would reach the edge of this town, find people, get his car
Spec found that he only had wisps of memories of the day's trip.
not to be that the memories of walking under the sun were lost
the first ray of the sun poke through the web of clouds to the
was just more tired than he'd thought. He decided that when the
next dawn began to approach he would stop walking and
concentrate on staying awake until the sun was well up. The time
green glow from the road and the white glow from the now
think of what cities he might be near, but this was Iowa and
only Des Moines came to mind. There was no way he'd walked the
aside when his eye caught a glow that flickered somewhere in the
orange aura with a yellow core. The core was nearly invisible,
just a slight shade different than the background light, but the
orange aura was a sharp contrast. With a few more steps, Spec
that it wasn't far off. Fixing his eyes on this fire, he began
to walk more quickly now. He decided that where there was fire,
there was life controlling the fire and he was bound to meet
himself awake. When the glow of the sun started to overpower the
glow of the city, Spec was too fixated on the fire to notice. He
dropped as though dead in the middle of the road when the first
in the road for a minute, enjoying the warm bar of neon across
his back, before he pulled his body upright and darted his gaze
his eyes reported the orange glow. Then he remembered his vow
and cursed himself for letting sleep rule him again. He knew he
would reach the fire tonight, so there was no need for further
vows. He got to his feet, knowing the answers were right there,
easily in reach.
the fire. The night was more than half over, and he had begun to
realize the fire was much bigger than a simple campfire, like
complete circle around the fire, noting that he was still unable
Perhaps this was some sort of mass burial pyre. Perhaps it was
little closer to the fire and thought he could just make out a
would only blow the flames away for a second, he knew that would
give him a good look. A few more steps and he could smell the
hair on his head start to smoke. Then the wind, like a nurse
revealing a newborn baby, pushed the flames back just enough for
car.
Spec retreated away from the fire, out of the heated air.
His arms and face felt sunburned. It wasn't that his car was
roadway, but the way the rear bumper dipped slightly, the way
the hood was buckled just over the fender, the beige paint still
visible in bubbling patches: these were all the knowns his mind
needed to reach the conclusion that somehow his car had been
He felt that the flames were consuming more than his car.
logic was one thing--that was a mistake even seasoned pros made.
revelations that came around only once every few hundred years.
the road. Day was approaching and with daylight came sleep: a
more present.
The dawn came and the minute the sun left this surface of
the Earth, Spec was moving again as though twelve hours had been
nothing but a blink. He felt his pulse begin to surge faster and
with more urgency as he finally was able to make out the first
shapes of the cityscape before him. Another night, maybe two and
was wrapped in neon. The road he'd left was now starting to
merge into his walking path and he could see it rise up, circle
mass of insects patrolled beneath its skin. The light from the
the cityscape met above the city and blended into the most
retina with such perfect precision that he wasn't sure the aura
He didn't notice when his feet met up with the familiar highway.
He barely registered the warmth that the neon road markers were
feeding to his feet. Only the wish to become one with the city
remained. In there he would find new axioms, new logic, and a
glory as the suns rays burst through the Earth's curve, bending
over the horizon to his eyes. It blinded him, for a moment, and
he had to jerk his head away and squeeze his eyelids shut,
diameter.
When his eyes cleared, the sun was a quarter way up and the
city was gone. The road looked like any other road in any
him. A new logic ruled now, he knew this for a fact. He would
sleep on the side of the road through this awful daylight and
when night came his city would return. When the sun left this
side of the Earth, the darkness would return his beautiful city
to him and the answers he sought would await him inside, in the
heart.
THE END