Speaker 1: Hello, I'm welcomed stories all the time. Glad you are here.
Let's get into it. The lights along high Way forty
four were fracted in broken pulses. As the midnight buss
to a halt its head, I was catching on puddles
that dotted the gravel turn out. I waited, one sneaker
balancing on painted lines washed nearly clean of yellow. My
recorder felt slick in my palm, digital numbers blinking as
I thundered away. Critual more than necessity, the kind of happened,
since that keeps He tethered to reality that sometimes WAPs
when you travel. At Weirdyer's. The driver, gaunt with fatigue,
corunted a greeting that was mostly vapor in the cold,
his hands heavy on the wheel. I tapped my fair card,
the beep and congruously cheerful, and moved past the silent
ticket box. Inside the bus was more sand than shape,
the gumble of the engine, blue lid overhead panels, and
the shifting third third of tires running over an even tarmac.
Two passengers hunched up front, faces absorbed by half glowing phones.
I nodded, without expecting a return. A certain type of
passenger rides at the sire where I contact is a contry,
neither party. Once The mail was a collage stale air
spelled energy drink, the faintest suggestion of something earthy and
ron The seemed to cling in corners. I made my
way past rosa scuff final sunlight long since vanished from
these seats. At round nineteen, my shoulder grazed the window,
and I noticed the graffiti. Rough circulo line scratched into
the tinto glass. Two circles, then another, overlapping in an
uncertain figure eight that felt for reasons i'd only half admit,
like a warning more than attack. My hand hovered over
the mark beneath the seat. The darkness seemed deeper, the
intrusion of my flashlight beam making it starker. There was
something stuffed under there. Hot knocking, a rhythm that wasn't
quite in time with the bus's motion. A crouch and
fisted out a battle canvas backpack. As canvas was rubbed thin,
one shoulder strapped, nearly worn through. Dirk kicked the seams.
I glanced up on edge. Nobody was watching. The passengers ahead,
didn't turn. I unzipped the main compartment my breath caught
with the scent of meldew in something sharper like pencil
shadings inside notebooks, snapped spirals, duct tape reinforcing the covers,
a tangle of headphone cords. A few bus transfers slept
so faded their ink was a specter of purple numbers.
The largest notebook fell open under its own weight. Pages
dense with slanted handwriting. As a bus took a turn,
the words seemed to shiver beneath the beam of my flashlight.
March none, I saw them again. Two seats up. Don't
trust the quiet ones if you ride too far, they
notice got on after Applewood, never made a sound, Circles
on the glass, always at the back. My wrist trembled
a little as I leafed through more pages. Most of
the entrant devolved into listings, bus numbers, times, cryptic warnings,
never sit at the back, not after the lights go,
Sometimes just the phrase the other passengers. Some pages were
rip halfway through, crossed up violently. The handwriting compressed from
all daily frustration to desperate etching, as if the author
had written while the bus rattled over potholes, or worse,
a gust of cold swept through. I shivered, but the
windows were sealed shut gums of black rest due holding
them still. From somewhere down the center, I came the
low drawing of murmured voices. But when I looked up,
the rancy showed nothing but the blue glow of screens.
I snapped the notebook shut heartaekeeping always found something on
the Elbera's line, I said vos, trying for rise. I
raised the recorder to my mouth, documenting the moment for
the benefit of my hypothetical late night listeners. Outside the
force pressed ride up to the shoulder trunks splintered by
the passing lens of the bus's head lights. Then the
vehicle rocked harder than before, pothole or perhaps a shift
in the grade. I clutched the bag mney bump in
a cold metal post of seat twenty. Between the flicker
of outside landscape and the sullen neon side the well
seen thinner. The distance between here and there, solid and uncertain,
shrunked to the length of a handful of occupied seats
in the back half of a midnight bus. Even the
driver was just a hunch silhouet at the front brackets
of reflection pressed against the glass. My pole filled the
gaps between the engine's monotonous arm. We pressed on deeper
into the dark, each drizzle streaked window giving way to
the expanse of woods and the glint of the next
small town as it emerged in the distant Celbridge, where
people said the night lines ended for good. In most
strangers eyes and the voice who chased down small ten
myths and urban legends. Hauling Stone Away was out of
static and boredom for an indie podcast, buried somewhere under
society and culture. That was the plan, anyway, until all
the sores started pointing to the same cold echo. People
disappear in Elbridge, some quietly, some with a bit of
drama of weather reports and search parties, but most often
with nothing but a ghost trail of tickets and unanswered texts,
a most heath barely detectable humming. Beneath the ordinary home
was a narrow apartment above a boarded up boga wall's
gardened with clippings, corosary receipts, overlapped faux coopered missing persons reports.
Lisa thought, while aged nineteen, last seen at Elbridge bus terminal.
Alan Khym seventeen, texted to be home soon and never
walked in the door. Ellowed post its, some curling at
the edges, clustered around a handrawn map where the bus
lines webb from cities center out toward Elberge, and then
then too a single hesitating line. The night run. The
grind wasn't to grind so much as a coping mechanism.
I split days into chunks, field into views at gas
stations and transit terminals, cataloging who'd seen what and how
many had simply stopped caring. At night the audio edits
we became a fortification, mixing backgrounds until the hit of
bad cable faded into the thrum of an old city
at rest. Most of my stories had been about lost pets,
embarrassing local legends, and were only in spirit, usually light
on existential threat. But the pile of detail grew heavier
after my brother vanished. He left a goodbye on ive
was mel a one off catch up. I'll call you
when I get in see you soon. Never arrived, never
called again. After weeks of stale waiting, the despatcher shrouked.
They all do, is Eldridge, What do you expect? At
two A m four official forms. Voluntary absence had to suffice,
but I archived everything, CCTV grabs, time stamped bus rosters.
Even Tip called him from old classmates, convinced he'd only
gone underground. There was a pattern. I told myself something
just below the official bore in my audio diaries, I
let the mask slip. If the records are just amazed
with no exit, maybe the answerer is off the books,
not shut in depression, not agoraphobic compulsion. Each missing person
was another stone pursing my chest, another name Tip to
the wall. The transit network was the city's circuitary system,
a patch for both intricate and fallible stations built old
commuters by the thousands seat Rushio. Most only cared about delays,
not the after midnight lines with irregular schedules and needigible ridership.
Alberge's tiny depot, framed by sodium vapor and sheep fencing,
stood as a relicave place, with the floors polished, weakly reflected,
ghostly outlines of forgotten crowds. I carried a microphone rig
that looked military issue. In half the time got me
double takes from drivers. They were a superstitious crew shaped
by years of night shifts. On the record, they'd speak
in that mild idiocy shore words. Stuff happens no more
so than anywhere else off the record. Eyes took on
a nervous clint. Try working after dark out there. You
hear things, said one sidelong in a booth named to
calf peeled off. Doesn't mean you believe it. I walked
the Alberge terminal with my gear, bags slung high, shoes,
grape and tile, missing persons, Posters hung crooked on a
wall on yellow with age plastic edges curled and lifted
by time. Each was a little editorial Have you seen
with a phone number that buzzed up to nowhere? I
recorded the story the wave voices bounced in the silence,
the drought footsteps of a tired janitor changing out garbage bags.
He glanced sideways when the recorder glimmered red. It's not
just kids either, he muttered, focusing on a stubborn clump
of chewing gum. Whole lives walk in and don't walk
out only after iurs it's the night lines. Everybody knows it,
but it's not theirs to talk about enough. I swung
the microphone out of his face, Silence pressed in thick
as wool. The office workers, when present, left by seven.
Remaining staff offered nothing but the same kend responses. If pressed,
they chucked the door or turn away, as if the
line between trans at law and public safety was just
another lot filing cabinet. My recordings, when playback in the
small eyves, sounded like confessions mine or someone else's I
couldn't tell. I would murmur thoughts to the recorder while
scanning online rumors surviving each night with microwave noodles and
too much caffeine. Every so often though something from the
regular weary rhythm with joga memory, my last argument with
my brother, his voice flat and tied, both of us
too proud and too stubborn. The ache was just manageable
if I pretended all missing people were obstructions, narrative beats,
not wounds. But Elbridge had a way of scratching at winds,
making the impossible scene not just probable, but pending, and
every so often impossible to ignore. Back in the static
gray of my kitchen, I made a list of names,
bus numbers, dates, folk corresponding to disappearances reported along the
elberdra spurad sheet scrolled past my exhausted eyes, but real
clues stubbornly refused to line up. No easy answers, no
neat connections except for a narrow window, no record of
transaction or digital trace. After midnight from those who'd bought tickets.
Family members uploaded frantic Facebook statuses. The language patterns were
disturbingly similar. Almost there stecks just past the woods. Some
mentioned odd folk or a sense of being watched before
their frig went dead in a window folded by night.
I played back interviews with relatives. A mother described her
son's word texts mentioning a stranger who wasn't on the cameras.
An older woman remembered her sister saying she felt wrong
every time the bus neared Elbridge. The store was overlapped,
but no one described the saying face twice, just the
same abstract presence lurking, where the bus windows darkened and
the world grew indistinct, the overlapping sir or scraped and
the bus window lingered in my mind. On a whim,
I scatured forms for local graffiti signals arroed on a
page devoted to regional superstitions. Someone posted a photo same circles,
tagged a bad luck sign avoid Another reply means wrong
end of town, seen it everywherek it goes missing. That night, restless,
I snuck into the deepest parking yacht after ires phone
camera stuttering as I scanned the rows of buses. Loud silence.
My sneak displayed puddles into oily galaxies beneath sodium lambs.
I checked windows with careful hands, kept my lens tight
to the glass. Only the Elbridge night in its carried
the ched circles only in the lower rear window, always
at the same spots seat nineteen morning runs were clean.
Sometimes in the stale confines of the night buses. My
own reflection caught and multiplied in the panes, just blauze,
sometimes a momentary second jatto behind my own. Once or
twice I heard steps echoed through the yard, sudden and sharp,
but found no source. That sense of being watched was
an old trick to mine. Played but here half recognized,
half dreaded. It felt less like imagination and more like preview.
Piercing through bus manifests and security footage had collected one
d Dell crystallized at least half of those missing since
March had entered or exited at or immediately near that
mark's heed at the back, half given names and despatch
of logs argued the same In a blue flicker of
my monitor at the pattern held an accusation sketch in
circles and seat numbers nets bled into one another. My
sleeper casualty. Each dreamed attempt to catalog the pattern only
led to more questions anchoring staff or sending room among
us in silence. The density of dread was cumulative. I
scribbled my own warning on to a post it stuck
it above my desk. If he run, run forward, not back.
I'd never liked night buses. They always felt less like
vehicles than thresholds, especially now, lines between ordinary and uncanny,
crumpling with everynee detail. Still each night, Richell carried me
back through the Elberge stores as if solvender might save
my brother. Retroactively. I met one of the old hands
behind the wheel after handing the supervisor for a local
color sound bite. Cherry Nane tad Crack looked like he'd
contained more stores than shifts. We talked, does he chet
hire pressure at his layer stop? Engine idling low. People
make up ghost stuff, he said, Gaze straight in the
ox of my my cord, and not everything's ghosts, not
around here. I drive as sea faces, half of him, tired,
half of him lost. Every once in a while, you
see someone twice in one night, but not the way
you remember him. I switched off the record a light.
He looked at me sideways, almost smiling, then said quieter.
Sometimes I get back to the depot and can't reckon
the memory of the trip, like minutes went missing, or
a face stands out, But then it's gone riders that
look wrong in the mirrors. Ye know what I mean.
He fumbled in his jacket and passed me a bat
at USB stick found this on the seat after one
of the night's security footage, but my supervisor didn't want
it locked. Maybe you'll see something I missed. My breath
quivered with anticipation. I pressed for more, but he shut down,
but stors hissing clothes. The next trip, his seat was empty.
Another driver had taken his shift. Name not listed back
at my kitchen table, might take friend Leo sat beside me,
hunched over a bat at that top, humming with fans.
We booted up the footage. The screens stuttered, time stamp skipping,
grinding through blocks of static like an old VHS. The
camera panned a clean sweep of the inside, mostly empty,
but then in quarter second flashes seats appeared, filled, faces blurred,
shifting pairs of ice sparkling white where passengers should have
been sleeping or watching the night crowbi Frame by frame,
Sometimes there was a scorny form in seat nineteen, sometimes
just an empty window, the mark only visible when angle
and light heeded just so Leah whistled through his teeth corrupted.
They tried to wipe the file, but whoever did it
was lazy. See these gaps. The minutes are gone. There
are breaks after key stops too. The notebook from the
battered backback became my constant companion. It's desperate, spiraling warning
scotch my thoughts. Don't trust the conductor. There is another
door driven by and saw me and dread. I mapped
out the stretch of blacked out highway mentioned in the journal.
Street lights vanished for three exits, forced and kempt and
wild on either side. I had past it off in daylight,
but night ungrainy video. It was a ribbon of nothing. Finally,
I boarded the RUD again, the journal, USB and new
recorder stashed in my bag. When my phone vibrated, I
I ignored it. I planned to ride the run from
the city out, counting the stops and track in the
missing minutes. Twenty minutes. Then the clock on my phone drifted.
The GPS location floated uncertain, some more miles off. My
truck was nowhere at all. The bus interior walked, which
shadows shifting as if waiting for a queue. I paced
back to seat nineteen and crouched, lifting the seat general
pages held open by my flashlight beam. The entries had
alluded to a key. I groped for something, nerves buzzing,
but found nothing except a residue sticky to the touch.
My flashlight picked out a bus transfer stop. Colors leached
out the tickets, sporting oddscript, not quite any language I knew.
Right then, the driver's was defonated through the speakers, as words,
rounding every vowl with a threat he didn't care to hide.
Next stop, Albert, if you're still here. Outside, trees pressed
closer than I remembered. Dartas swelled in the aisles as
if the lights themselves recoiled, my own reflection ghosted in
the glass, marred by the overlapping circles, cold in the window.
At two in the morning, as I poured over my
second note copy, while the world outside blurred, my phone pinged.
Once a message request from a unknown the preview line
stopped my breath called found you meet me. I borrowed
Leo's living room, this time barricading the door with a
box of hard drives for extra caution. Across one speaker,
a voice message fluttered with feedback, then settled. A woman's whisper,
accented by tiredness and something sharper. This is ell at
the rest garbled into static. She sounded younger than I expected.
I wrote the journal. You don't know me, but I
follow because I had to, because they watch us too.
They ride with us. They always ride with us. The
circles they aren't for the driver's offer us. It signals
used safe, who's owed something back or who lets them on?
Get out, move seats next time, don't look back, don't
let yourself be candied. Then the feet garbled again, breaking
into digital screech that resolved for a heartbeat into her
hiss word they see you. I fumbled instinctively switching the
recorder to an isolated track, but her final message cut off,
as if a hand had ripped it away outside Leo
was in the kitchen. I didn't move, just reeblade the
cadence of her fear back on the notebook. Another pattern
tugged at my thoughts. Every corrupt as surveillance state, each
unexplained gap, every error logs fell within a block of
shifts matching a single despatch as Eyres, an old name
Harbin stamped sloply but repeatedly. I flipped through bus logs
and cross checks signatures enough times to be sure, always
present when something weird surfaced. One missing person's last text
reference to a guy behind the glass, staring like I
was wrung, driven by something between duty and obsession. I
left the apartment and made my way voice recorder clutched
against my chest to the transit office behind Albridge's gray depo.
The staff lounge was a mausoleum at this ire, computer
screens showing only the doll glow of locked terminals. I
took the long way, tracing my rope within certain steps
until I found the despatch window there behind the fog glass.
A thin man sat, white shirt, no badge, stucking behind
paper sacks as if expecting confrontation. Harbin scratched on his clipboard.
I cleared my throat. He froze. I was claudy over
thick glasses. He knows something about the night runs. Heering
the logs and the missing tapes, and they I tried
to keep my voice flat, unaccusing, but the weight of
evidence made my words brittle. He sneered, thin lipped, didn't down.
I pressed a recorder to the slot in the glass,
and a door at the end of the whole clicked,
opened loud to liberate. Two men in dark uniforms drifted in.
Not security, at least not staff. I'd ever seen Badger's
glinting rom They barked orders. My brain skipped adrenaline in
shirting forocus. They wrenched my arm, not too gently, pulling
the record free. Their expressions clinically blank as they rifled
my back and pocketed the notebook. We'll need to talk
to you somewhere else, one said, no inflection, It dropped
the act. No recording equipment allowed, Not for you. He's
a trouble maker. The despatcher spat always snooping. They marched
me down an interminable corridor, out of the rear emergency exit.
Everything blowed by humiliation and something cold to fear that
felt old and freshly sharpened. The lot behind the deeper
was empty but for the shimmer of one late besideling
by the curb, its rear windows burned with fresh graffiti,
the overlapping circles glinting against the soft orange flood of
the street lamp. The door shuddered closed. The engine's hum
was the only heartbeat. The figures hustled back inside, leaving
me alone in the sodium light emptiness. As the night
bus weezed off into limitless dark destination, outrage, no longer
accepting passengers, The hollow ache in my chest vibrated with
the force of everything unresolved, the question unanswered. A brother
nedd returned, the echoing dare of another ride out of reach.
Some were just beyond the halo of light, the woods
and the night passed close in the distance. Another bus
passed by, its windows shining purely black, showing nothing but
threat and the pale glimmer of circles. Left. But those
who knew too much and still vanished anyway. The silence
of the lot pressed against my ears sharp a somehow
after the chatter of authority, in the bright, antiseptic light
of the deeper halls, I stood a moving feeling, the
grain of cold concrete biting through my shoes. My hands
shook as I robed. My wrists were a security man's
grip had left it tingling and sore. For a long minute,
I did nothing, et ceter try to gather myself, fist
in my pockets, with imprint of the recorders still echoing
alarm my palm. The night seemed to hold its breath,
waiting for my next move, as if even the small
animals in the underbrush had agreed to freeze. I forced
myself to put one foot in front of the other,
heading back towards the main road, my eyes darting to
the side fence, half depecting another dark uniform figured to
melt out of the shadows and haul me back. The
boss that had just left shrunk in the distance, red
tail lights flickering the overlapping circles, catching the lost glimpse
of the street light, almost like the mark was watching me,
or I was supposed to be afraid. The message was
clear enough. I glanced down the crack sidewalk, orienting myself
by habit, letting the street names roll through my head
as a distraction. Railroad avenue stretching thin, leading out toward
the doughnut shoppen, next to nothing else. My ride home
was theoretically waiting, but after an eject like that, getting
back on girt felt dangerous. My phone buzzed in my pocket,
Maybe LEO, maybe not. I checked it instinctively two misnotifications.
First was a routine banking alert. The next and unknown
number a blood thumbnailt in one word sent by a
text that already reads expired walking. My thumb hovered over
the keep it, but I didn't reply. Paranoid pressed height
against rational thought. Messages could be tracked, conversations could be overheard.
I didn't need another warning, but the words stuck echoing
in my head as I heard my footsteps. I passed
the perimeter of the deeper sucking night ifrough my tee,
feeling awake in the weight that only fear or bitness
can produce. By the time the horizon hinted at the
first pale lines of dawn, I was three neighborhoods away.
Every inch farther from Elbert, bringing a shallow sense of
reprief A string of chainling fencing the kind sacking beneath
the weight of rusty no trespassing signs ran beside me.
The bus rumbled past, heading the wrong way. Mercifully, I
waited for it to disappear before ducking into a corner
bodega head dam. The cashier didn't ask questions. I bought
a bottle of cheap water and thumb through my wallet,
mine clattering with phantom echoes. As I scanned the shelves
of faded gun packets and candy bars. My gaze flaked
across a strip of local broadshets clipped to the counter
near the bottom. I head line shrieked up from the
blow of text up which night line closed for repairs.
I thought the urge to laugh, the sounds stifled in
my throat. Even the newspapers co operated. My hands trembled
slightly as I fit coins into the paphon by the door,
diling ly or by muscle memory. Hey, I said, when
he picked up his void. I'm sure if the eye
are justified being angry O word hugh out hias no
need to clarified the meaning. Yeah, I lost em, I replied,
stirring at the shelves, as if some product label held
the seeker cot to all things. You need a ride,
I bit my lip. I'll make it. Stay out of
sight to night. I'll come by tomorrow. Don't open the
door unless you recognize my knock. There was a pause.
He didn't tape over the good file on the U
s B, did you, I smiled, more for comfort than wit.
Of course not. It's uploaded everywhere, just in case. He
exhaled relief audibly through the receiver. I wish you'd call
the copse. They're not going to help, I said, tiredness
thickening my tongue. They part of the script may be
not the same act, but close enough. Leon new when
not to argue. All right, crashier if you want, or
at least let me know you'll get in a few hours.
I'll check in. I hung up, spun the phone cord slowly.
The brief human contact steadied me. Even in the fluorescence
of the Boca, surrounded by isles smelling faintly of cleaning agent,
the floor scuff white by ten thousand careless customers. Mari
reflection in a window glass was a ghost between snack
displays and advertisements for cheap cigarettes. When I parted the
past a curtain and stepped outside again, the restless urged
to pace overtook me. It took nearly and iou to
walk back toward home, partly by choice, partly because the
bus stops now struck me as stage as bill for
someone else's drama. My limbs ached and my mind went
in circles, reviewing every detail of the despatch office, the
faces of the men who dragged me out, the almost
bored indifference of harping behind the glass. Here is in
my head, nord at the facts, the journals, the messages,
the despatchers. I was lining up with lost footage and
skip records, the circles only in the night buses, the
list of names that never made it home. That was
the arithmetic, I told myself, Nothing supernatural, just a chain
of ugly little acts, repeated with enough notes that every
body's responsibility blurred. I slipped up the back steps of
my building, using the key with care not to rattle
the metal. My apartment was stuffy with heat. The window
left shut in my rush to leave, and I flicked
in the fan with a sigh. I checked twice for
anything missing. Recorder go on, but my back up drive
sat beneath a pile of notebooks. I exhaled for real,
this time, letting tension leak from my shoulders as I
locked the door and collapsed onto the bed. Sleep didn't come,
but exhaustion took over. The city buzzed outside, the noise comforting,
now a reminder that most people's mysteries started and ended
much smaller. When I opened my eyes again, the angle
of late morning sunlight carved lines across the wall, map
slicing the routes to Albridge and to abstract geometry. I
checked my phone, No messages, nothing new except the mispuss
from Leo and a single notification from a service I
didn't remember, signing up for a bus arrival or at
Elbridge line scheduled twelve four a m. The thing was
the line had been shut from maintenance. My heart thump
givesprom's marching along my arms. I disabled the notification reluctantly,
or where I was likely being watched through means i'd
never understand. I swept the room, checked my laptop, trace
the path of my steps back to the apartment. Nothing
made sense. There was an impulse run, disappear, leave the
hunt to some one else. The urge drained away almost
at once. Instead, I poured coffee and opened the browser.
News on the Elbridge lines close was already old forums
buzzed with speculation routine repairs or budget cuts, or a
safety event no one dared to fine. The subreditts, usually
a source of quippy cynicism, were quieter than I ever seen.
For as about missing people hung limply unanswered, marked as
aloft by mozitte request of local law enforcement. Whisper networks
remained alive in texts, however, messages passed, long fees and
side channels stay off. The last run only right daytime.
It don't sit near the back. And always there was
the circle. With nothing else to direct my focus except
my own obsessive schemes. I opened the left of a
browser taboff webb chatter about the overlapping circles. Here the
speculation was more feverish theories about secret societies, initiation rights,
government experiments, even supernatural explanations. Usually I would sift these
for humor and resonance, for the coincidence that sometimes hid
a core of truth to day as zeroed in on
the user names who posted more than once, threading between
mythology and something more credible. On one message board, someone
named Lulin Lawry posted a series of time stamps, each
corresponding to winger feety circles had been cleaned off worre
etched over. In the comments, a user named back at
nineteen replied, cleaning doesn't matter, they mark new ones. It's
always for some one. If you see two circles sit
up front, if there is free, don't get on. Something
about the exchange felt rehearse to transmitted for an audience
rather than a direct response. I opened an off fine
man tracing old bus routes. Using the dates and times
cross reference from both posts. In my own field notes,
I compiled a pattern of locations. Most were on the
night runs, and when square is lined up, there was
always a missing person logged within forty eight hours of
the new circles appearing on a bus or in one case,
at an otherwise unremarkable suburban stop. I studied the latest
journal scan I'd say before the original was seized. The
author's drawings had started as bus and tiers, rows of seats,
crewe block people with circular heads, always shadowed in the rear.
Later sketches devolved outlines of the night forest, the lights
blotted out a triangle overlaying two circles. In one alarming scroll,
someone had written, not police dispatch, not driver's other management,
only at night, never alone never. My memory retraced the
desperate voice in the last message, the clitch breaking her
warning into I wondered if she was safe, whether her
own compulsion to document had driven her deeper into danger,
or somehow at the other side. Again, the need for
real evidence pressed inside my skull. I scrolled through my
safe files, then checked online for anything new under Harbin's name.
A search turned up nothing official, not even basic employment
records outside transit shift locks. But on a private forum
frequented by retired transit staff, some one had asked any
one seen Harbin from the old Knight descolately heredies on permanently,
but no one told us why, no replies I through.
I did this together with the U s B security footage,
notes from the journal, the observations from drivers, my own
sense of a knees, my plan formed in fractured steps
locate the source of the despatch signals. Tried to identify
the full cycle of marked buses, get an unbroken surveillance file.
All felt impossible and necessary in equal measure. With no
recorder but my phone close at hand and Leo's old
camporder clunky clicke thing that stored actual tape, I prepared
for another rounded the deeper, I scanned the window for watchers,
nerved myself up with cheap coffee, and sent LEO coded
message meeting with Loss and Fountain night. If I don't
check in lock up. I spent the rest of the
day plodding the Elbridge lot wouldn't have another bus leaving
until midnight. I needed to get inside after iyres were
at least up to the park buses, before roster changes
were set everything. I also needed a back up location
if things went wrong, where I could stash physical evidence
for Leo. The eyres ticked by bags under my eyes
grew heavier around dusk. I dialed the number left by
the last missing persons posted, just to see if there
be an answer. A man's voice answered, hollow and suspicious.
I almost hung up, but forced myself to speak, Hi,
I'm a reporter. I'm following up When the Aulbridge disappearances.
He left your number on a missing poster. Fur I
fumbled the notes with Alison Fern, the brittle pause. I
told everyone what I could. Police said not to get
involved any more. The voice said flat. Did she ever
say anything about the bus, the late shift, or the
back seats breathing on the other end. Then a muttered confession.
She said, the bus seem barn Wayit smiled where you'd
see the same person two nights, running but sitting in
opposite places. She called me scared before she went missing.
She said she thought some one was following Auer, but
was sure not a person. The voice broke a little
at the end. I heard a chair creak, muffled sobbing,
then the lan click dead. My gilt, already jagged, was
a little sharper. Evening fell dense and bleuw, the office
windows of Elbridge deeper, blinking out one by one. When
I finally headed back, the neighborhood was nearly deserted. I
cut across the side alley, skirted the staff entry, trailed
by my own overshadow. I kept to the pools of darkness,
hot battering my ribs, the camcorder hidden beneath my arm
at a chain between two barriers, approached waiting for guards
to finish their round. No movement from inside the office,
just the quite buzz of machinery. The lots melt of
rubber and metallic rain. All night busses sat in a row,
some with windows still beat it with condensation. I docked
behind a row of trash bins, scanned the yard. The
same circles clung to the glass of bus after bus,
some new, others only faintly visible under the sodium vapor lamps.
I waited a count of my breast tying the God's rout,
until I slipped toward the dark. A span of bus
windows farther in the angles turned rom The lot was
too quiet, as if what happened here in the day
belonged to another whirl, separated by some invisible membrane. I
brushed my hand across the graffiti, feeling the etching with
the tip of a finger. Ralph notched it hastily, but
left as a sign for the next Something about touching
a mark made my malcho dry. I froze, forcing myself
to record a hush note on my phone. In the
elveradge lot, all roar windows mark no new repairs, only circles,
one spot per bus, always seat nineteen. No sign of
cleaning efforts. Whoever marks the ease, it's for some one
who's looking, not hiding. I'm standing here thinking my brother
must have touched the same etching before he vanished. I
want to believe there's an answer away home, A coat
that isn't just another warning for another name to go missing.
My whisper caught bitter and scared. A shape moved at
the far edge of the lot, a security guard or
some one else, their steps slow and methodical. I pressed
myself flush against the metal, holding my breath until the
silhouette turned away, a flush light being flicking along another bus.
I slipped sideways back into the dark, my pulse lad
in my ears. Step by step, I traced the perimeter,
snapping phone photos where I could, sliding a handle on
the coal metal until the camcorder clicked, the old tape
wharriing as appointed it through the bus doors, assuming on
the interior. In the grainyvy finder, Seat nineteen loomed empty,
the circle vivid against the gloom. For a moment, it
looked as if a shape hunched just beyond the aisle,
half in light, half reflected. I blinked, blinked again, but
found nothing except the corrosion on the armress. Movement again
farther down the lot, my nose caught fire. I docked
out the same way had come, bolting through chill air,
praying I was moving too softly to register to any watcher.
I didn't stop running until I reached the side street,
long singing, with cold taste of metal bright in my mouth.
I ducked into the first alley with cover back, pressed
a brick and checked my phone. One new notification blinked
at me to night, last bus act seat, no circles
sent from an unlasted number. No reply possible. My skin
crawled with fear and anticipation both. Was it a trap
a genuine message signal from the journal's author. Iris remained
until midnight. I sat on the stoop, reviewing my footage,
pacing my plan into muscle memory, ready to board one
last time if that's what it took for answers. Intermitten
traffic glided down the half flit street, each set of
headlight painting the opposite wall with rectangles of nervous brightness.
Somewhere behind me, another bus rumbled through the neighbor cross street,
already gone. By the time I looked over my shoulder,
the world, minus the secret was moving on as usual.
People got home and went to sleep. I watch waited,
hungry for what only happened here after midnight. Tomorrow might
bring answers or another name on a poster, a fresh
circle scratched into glass. There was only the weight and
the darkness, and the line between the two felt as
thin as the night itself. The day after I was
drapped into the parking lot, I short circuited every habitual movement.
I could barely touch the record of even leaves bat
at Concorda glared at me from atop a pile of laundry.
But for at still eat with the memory of security's grip.
Never mind fear. It was humiliation that grated most. My
bags studded down beside the door, and I braced the
knob with my palm, breath locked deep until Leo texted
twice or quiet here, then anything new. I stared too
long at the screen before replying no, trying to regroup.
My voice felt like it belonged to some one else.
It wasn't that I'd lost evidence. The most vital files
had been uploaded. What I'd lost really was the thread.
How many times could you circle the same names, the
same sleepless wood at the county's edge Before even the
determination got nunned. My apartment was a bunker behind a
dozen locks. It didn't make me feel safer. I drank
instant coffee and stared at the map above the kitchen table,
the tangle of colored string and post it notes that
didn't add up to anything, not even to closure. The
alverage night line closed for maintenance was a lie that burned.
I couldn't stop picturing the buses at stall, lights wet
alled away in the sodium vapor last night, an animal
vanishing into timber trailing circles etched in glass as a dare.
But the game moved on with though without me. Before noon,
my inbooks began sputtering again, First the usual spam, then
a series of messages appearing from addresses only a hand
full of people knew the families, parents, siblings, their girlfriend
who shake a voice memory I cupied to my hard
drive months before. Some were only checking in asking for upbates,
others suspected in careful phrasings that something was happening out
in the open. At last, one from a cousin of
a vanished commuter, asked if I'd seen the police tape
around the north lot that morning. Cops everywhere said it's
a break in, but there were helicopters. I remembered two
security men, the blank faces, the way they had locked
eyes with the despatcher as he scurried behind glass. Harbin
wasn't a uniform, he was a node, a participant. That clarity,
stated me, sharpened the concrete realization of the stakes. Everyone
on the inside of the system was performing a part.
Even last night's thugs didn't act on their own. The
real proof wouldn't wait behind a counter. It would be
out there in the roster's Leo at half act, in
the scold initials and code names, and the deeper love
books on the footage that maybe maybe someone else had
stashed before me. I refrained from cataloging what could happen
if I gave up. The missing were in abstractions, not
any longer. My brother's all geared photo on the edge
of the desk kept it reel. I called Leo at noon,
I want to meet just for an hour. I need
help with a new angle. He answered too quickly. He
was probably waiting for my call. Were not my place?
Not now, We'll meet at the park two o'clock by
the tennis Corps. I hadn't played tennis in years, but
the reference was familiar, and the spot was public enough
to banish the sense of lurking watchers. I brought only
what was necessary, my phone, the battered notebook I managed
to copy before it was snatched, and a single thumb
drive loaded with a fuzzy security footage plus the shakest
lead scrolled over a day of obsessive note taking. Leo
waited on the bench, and a cap pulled low sun
Buss's hiding most expression. He slid an envelope my way,
eyes fixed on a couple slow dragging by. It got
something from an old friend at the phone company. Only
pings on the Albert were at random busts, like phantom phones,
activating for a few seconds then nothing. Can't trace them,
but a pattern matches the missing persons manifests always the
last run. I smoothed my thumb over the warm packet,
old phone logs, bus roster print outs, and something new,
a yellowed water smash page torn from what looked like
a depot notebook, three names next to each a time,
a codolpha, bravo, delta, then a tight spiral circles at
the bottom, two block initials i'll h match in the
journal's author, and a final note rushed in spiky. Always
ride the last run. Don't let them count you, Leo
shifted closer. I heard something out at the depot. My
own contact says three drivers rotated off the late shift
over night, supposedly for stress, but no replacement listed. None
of them went home. Think it's a coincidence. I shook
my head. They're moving people out, changing the script. The
urgency knife through my exhaustion. I need to get back in,
find the survivor. Maybe she left a map the oor
symbols in the notebook. See I pointed to a crude
rendering a highway lines gide so the right angle formed
a triangle overlaid with three circles. You understand what that means?
He shrugged, secret stops head in exchanges. I don't know,
but if you go back, you can't go alone. They
watch the law, the despatch are still there. Probably the
cops won't help. But I raised a hand stopping him.
I have to think about what's at stake. If I disappear,
I'll plut everything straight to the Congressional, amongst the families,
the press, all of it. Leo's voice dropped. Yeah, sure,
but be careful. He scanned the park, nervous, there's something else.
I checked phone logs to see where your brother's phone
last pin day after it dropped off at Albert, someone
turned it on just for a minute. The next night
had stopped north of here. Then never again. My mouth
dried out. I'd force myself to believe it was lost, stolen, discarded,
dead in some shallow ditch. Now visions crowded in a
phone we enemated just long enough to signal a hand
off at trotsfer, part of some calculated exchange, and traceable
by any normal means. It was proof that what happened
on these buses didn't always stop with a single disappearance.
A hard knot settled under my ribs. I scobbled a
signal for Leo to leave, then stuffed the envelope into
my coat. Before he walked away. He reached over and
squeezed my arm. The look and his eyes clear, you'll
do this, No, matter what back in my apartment. Thus
drew the city encloser, tight light, no sliding under the skin.
The walls pressed with the sense of time moving in
two directions, the past threatening to call back in the future,
prickling with dread. I texted two of the relatives careful
only with generic reassurances, while encrypting the latest day to
dump for backup. I didn't trust the cloud, or the police,
or even the press. At this point, the system out
there was still very much intact and alive. Dark came quickly,
and with it the static of anxiety, key to every
low sound from the street. I checked the peephole three times,
double bolted the door. The city outside buzzed and wailed,
But here it was the slow tick of intention, not memory,
that made me pack my bag in you the Alberge
night Run would leave with or without me. If what
the survivors and code had map suggested was honest. To
night and to night only would be the window. Ten
minutes before midnight, I laced up my boots, secured the
camcorder under an old parker, and texted Leo gone to
catch the last line. If you don't get a final
pang by foy and mail everything. His reply was immediately sculomoji,
then a shield. I made my way out Hodlow, blending
into the garbage de crowds and late nights dragglers. The
street smelled of burnt oil when twisted wrappers scittering in
the gutter, I cut through alleys. Insight streets were tracing
the path to the elverage deepot with something more like
resignation than adrenaline. A single stray cat trapped me two blocks,
then vanished behind a dumpster. The lot was deserted except
for one batter taxi idling at the curb as driver
half asleep, hat pulled down. I checked the map on
I formed no service. Predictably, the night besidled beneath the
sodium vapor windows, reflecting nothing but black excerpt again for
the faint echo of circles scratched into the rear glass.
I stooped, ducked behind a trash can, waited for a
perimeter check. No movement. The rear gate to the lot
was closed. The fence slumped beneath its own rst. I
circled white, slipped through kinkin amesh. This was the point
of no return. The lust shot to see, to capture,
to prove. I approached the bus from the blind side,
heart thudding, adrenaline now circulating, sharp and cold. The metal
shell was bone cold to the touch. I slid open
the door and locked on and stepped inside. The erran
sight was still threatening. My sneakers quaked on the rubber
tread under the blue puddle light. Half the seats glimmered
with moisture. The circles on Seat nineteen glared back. I
ran my fingers along the scarred vinyl, pulled open the
metal slit below a slip of line. Paper fluttered loost,
just a single word penned in a tight, juttery hand
to night. My pole's hiccupped. A crackle came from overhead
of voice warped by the greenness of old speakers. Final
boarding for elbertch to step quickly. I ducked instinctively, then
climbed higher into the bus, choosing a seat in the
first half. Camcorder in my lap. The bus doors shudder hut,
and the wall narrower to the length of a lonely aisle,
and the faces scattered in shatters. The bus rolled out
of the bay, driver half lit like a priest the night,
giving nothing away in return. We rumbled out of a
deeper siallet lot emerged with the arterial sweep of Highway
forty four. The bus's motion steady as a trans drum.
I sat hunched near the front, hungrily scanning for any
one I might recognize. A tired man in a blue windbreaker,
a pair of students muttering over Earbard's, an elderly woman
knitting with slow and certain movements, nothing unusual if he
discounted the way. None of the riders met my eyes.
I depressed a record in the cam quorder by feel.
Pixelated green lines scrolled over the lens battery, a half tape,
churning with every bump. I held my phone loosely as
a texting, careful to angle its cracked camera toward the
rows behind me. Through the glass, Elbert loomed in the distance,
no broader or more meaningful than a place he passed
through out of necessity. Every few blocks we stopped at
ghosy shelters or in front of convenient stores. With Neon
Hart pulsing. Two more passengers boarded, Both men in on
the script jackets, movements too synchronized to be accidental. They
had a part life and right, and I noted them
in the fresh page of my note book. New faces
look at hands, knot screens, alert scanning the bust end.
The driver's voice us from overhead again, we'll be making
limited stops to night. Please stay in your sign seats.
Something in the tone confided itself to those listening for codes.
At the midway mark, we entered a blacked out stretch
border by forests that huddled up to the road of
no ambient light from houses or signs, only the rimmic
cut of the head lights. I could make out shapes
beyond the glass, sometimes just branches, sometimes more edgeless forms
that melted into the periphery. My own time since walped
each mile longer than the last, every curve identical. I
saw glances at my phone. The clock flicker displayed midnight,
then too too, then was blank. The movement of the
bus slow, the engines noised alled. The woman with the
knitting dropped a stitch, Her hands trembled, The air felt charged,
prickling at my scalp. A few rose behind. One of
the new men stowed, fixing his gaze on the rear.
He seemed to size up, both the passengers and the
edged circles and the glass. I held my breath, waited
for what I'd rehearsed in my mind a dozen times,
confrontation or revelation, or some simple explanation. Instead, the man
returned his seat, folding his hands, waiting. Then the bus
jerked once hard, as if something had stepped on to
the road, and the vehicle, too obedient, stopped just shy
of collision. Passengers startled, seat creaked. No one spoke. The
engine idled for an eternity, then shut off in the
perfect hush before any one could break it. A tall
figure in a conductor's uniform entered from the front force,
carrying with it an authority shape by habit more than
by threat. Tickets out verification required. Each passenger, myself included,
produced a battered slip or fluster of He checked tickets
with mechanical precision, glancing at the serial numbers, rubber stabbing
only select ones. When he reached me, his gaze lingered
longer than necessary purpose of travel. He murmured, ice narrowing
the journalist, I said, a voice lower than a whisper
on assignment, a pause just long enough to signal understanding,
he stamped my ticket. Any waitanks watched or ring overlap
in the arch of the elbridge logo. He continued down
the aisle. The last passenger, a teenager in a hoodie,
produced a ticket that looked too new. The conductor scrutinized it,
then knotted him through. For a moment, all seemed routine.
Then the driver's voice, soft but caring, intoned, prepare for transfer.
Those words alien in a bus context landed with unmistakable dread.
At the edge of my hearing, A hissing began, maybe static,
maybe whispered codes run through a pet truck of radios.
The two men in jackets slurched up in tandem, hustled
toward the back the bus lights. What remained of them sputtered,
then steaded at half The rear door raffled in the
isle's convex mirror. I watched as another g faces shadowed
filed on board, exchanging noobs with the conductor. They took
inventory of the seat in glancing at the mark circle.
One gesture, finger drawn across the mark like a priest benediction,
before signaling toward the hoarded teenager, who shrank back in
his seat. The woman knitting sat frozen her ball of wol,
rolling to the edge of the aisle. I call her,
looking at me, a plea heavy in her eyes. I
pressed record anwscrambled for words on elbridge, ran on expect
to transfer, possible force removal. I slipped the phone into
an inside pocket, lens peeking between the folds of my coat,
helping the angle would catch faces, badges, whatever would service proof.
Suddenly an arm clamped round my shoulder. One of the
jacketed men glared down at me, brat sire for his pitch,
so only I would hear. You should exit here now.
He propelled me half standing, hand biting into my triceps.
My instinct was to fight, before I remembered the back
up plan. I pressed the concorder into his wrist, accidentally
turning it toward the aisle. He forced me back, murmuring
reporter Wright, always watching, always talking. He flicked something into
my lap A transfer slip folded into a triangle. I
opened at hands, trembling on the paper, harping platform b
one a m. They expect you. Suddenly the passenger with
the hood was dragged upright to shoved toward the back door.
The rest of us stared dumb stroke, paralyzed by the
sense of rulls breaking, wild's colliding. The conductor brandished a
page and the teen was led away, vanishing into trees,
bristling with night. A moment later at the bus dirked
back to life, engine coughing, lights flaring to full brightness.
The driver's voice was cheerier than ever, rehearsed and hollow
as an airline safety videer. Thank you for your compliant
final stop Alberdge. In seven minutes, no one spoke, shokashed
language that deadened every muscle. The knitting woman fumbled her
yawn into her back, staring holes in the floor. I
kept the slip in my palm, nerves white hot. The
bus coasted back onto the imperfect rubon of highway, drawing
us to that final, always ambiguous destination. The depot emerged,
half shrouded by trees. I watched the entrance, noting the
forms of two security gods pacing the current faces averted,
doing their best to avoid looking at the windows. The
bus hissed breaks, sighing as we rolled to a stop.
I clutched my back. Other passengers clustered to the exit,
careful to avoid any show of panic. We shuffled on
to the platform in silence. The woman who'd been knitting
caught my sleeve. She whispered, a not so much in fear,
but with the urgency of some one passing on the
last match before the light runs out. Don't go. Any
One who meets him alone doesn't come back. I nodded,
feigning nonchalance, but my chest clamped tight, as if I'd
swallowed a stone. A few feet away, one of the
jacket demand thum. The despatch officers keep at shooting me
a warning glance and spoken instruction to stay away. I
ignored it, moving instead toward the far end of the platform,
where the transfer slip implied a different entrance between broken
down vending machines and the stench of spilt soda. I
tisted a handle on the side door. It was unlocked.
Inside the staff arears sprawlt deserted at the hire, empty chairs,
monitor showing static, the distinct absence of anyone cleaning or overseeing.
I ducked into a corridor lined with all photocollages of
employee picnics and shattered clock faces. A fluorescent bulb flickered
above a security door stamped with the platform b The
corridor was empty, the world gone thick with the hum
of machines. On the other side, a thin man in
a light windbreaker hobbyin waited, framed by the glaring rectangle
of CCTV monitor. He invited me in without open palm,
exhaust in twisted his features. No sleep, Two many nights,
moved by scripts, he only half controlled the last run
for you? Isn't it harbinass force? Brittle? Exhausted, he motioned
for me to sit at a folding table piled with
buzz logs, a rotary phone, and a half empty bottle
of collar. You want the story, or maybe the rest
of it. I pressed a record on the phone, shielded
it with my body. Where are they going the once
from the back? Is it all trafficking? He gave a
sad shrug, half contempt, half apology. There is more money
moving people than moving freight these days. Some disappear suddenly,
others slowly. Not all come up listed, but mostly it's
about debt, threats, leverage. He spread his hands. I just
moved the pieces, the ones marked. Sometimes therein, sometimes they
are out. The rest. Nobody cares. My nerves shivered recognized
in the script the effort to normalize evil through Benardi.
I pressed harder the circles. They're tight for insider's safe passage.
The mark means you're known off the ledge. Sometimes it
means protection. Sometimes target depends on who's running at that ride.
I don't paint them. He laced his fingers, glancing sidelong
at the security feed. Sometimes I get messages same as
you never sign my own name. Don't ask questions. My
anger rose to the surface, and the ones who don't reappear.
He avoided my gaze. You know the tensions seroted between
us a press Where's my brother? Harbin actually winced. I
don't know. Really, I could say out, I could say lost.
But the gaps are deliberate. Records go missing, files get replaced,
Footage gets scrubbed. Part of the deal. They move names around,
shuffle debts, cut the line when it suits them. I
only see the paperwork. He steepled his hands for suddenly sharp.
If he publish, you'll get half the truth. The rest.
These people don't go down easy shut one route they
opened to remark. You saw the alerts. Do you know
the circles aren't just on buses now. Just then a
clackes and thudded through the core door, not an alarm,
but the heavy industrial buzzer, signaling a change and shift.
Harbin rose, smoothing the cuffs of his windbreaker. Time's up.
If you want to make it out, go now. If
you stay, he shrugged, finishing the sentence with the wariness
of goodbye. A shoff all and a half strangled cough
came from the hall. Someone too approached. Harbin moved toward
the security glass, pumped open the emergency ate it latch
beside his chair. He paused just long enough to look
me in the eye. You want a face for your story,
take mine, but it won't save you. Get the evidence
down the line. Don't come back. I barely heard him,
barely had time to gather my back, slipped the camcorder
into my jacket before said of heavier boots closed. Then
the door rattled on its hinges. Two security men again,
face as blank as knuckles. Harbin drew himself up, blocking
my retreat. He's leaving en of shift for a second.
It looks like they'd argue instead. One reached behind his back,
which drew a bundless stack of cassettes each labeled only
with dates and bus numbers. Harbin pushed them into my hands,
forced so low. I flinched to hear it. Take these
proof if anything happens, send them. It's not everything, but
it'll hurt them. One security man raised nyghbra, but let
it go. I edge pass, pull's fluttering, every sense vibrating
out in the corridor. I ran, not with relief for terror.
I didn't stop until I hit the outside out of
brettorn from my throat. It was two in the morning.
My phone dead frivees flickered live. Two messages queued, the
first a blurry image of a bus seat marked with
three circles the caption to night. The second an audio file.
Tinney stressed, I played it hard out amizing the survivor's voice.
The journals Autho crackled live, her ax and sharper than
in the message before go Now, if you're hearing this,
I'm at the last stop beyond the woods. Doors open,
but they never really close. They'll try to trade you
like they did the others. Always ride near the front.
Don't trust anyone who doesn't meteor eye. I'll leave this
for you. Come if you want out for real, desperation
or exhaustion pushed me. I checked the time, some cent
just minutes before I scanned the edge of the depot,
Beyond the fence. The woodland press, close branches graping the wind,
crowned thick with needles. The moon was gone behind clouds,
but a thin pocket flasklight still shone from the tree's mouth, tiny, deliberate,
drawing me forward. No other choice lined up. I pressed
through the side gate, slipping into the tree line, certain
now I'd been seen only because someone wanted me to
him move. My lungs bit were cold. Needles scraped my
face as I moved, stepping over the shattered cylinder of
a flashlight abandoned halfway in. Wind battered the high branches,
the darkness felt denser than ever, a live thing responding
to my footfalls closing in As I forced a path
toward the signal. Somewhere behind me, shouts tangled with the distance.
I risked a look over my shoulder and saw nothing
but the sway of branches and a glinting pair of
headlights from a receding bus. I staggered on, hoping the
survivor el was truly alive, not just another voice snared
in my phone. Every step taxed my focus. A clearing
opened scuffed herth ringed by pale mushrooms and trash too
clean to be old. At the edge of the circle,
the flashlight sat half submerged in mound, beaming like a taunt.
A person stepped from shadow, short angular jacket stained with
road dust. She regarded me with suspicion, then the horrid
pragmatism of a fellow fugitive. You followed the message brave
or stupid to eat away? You made it. Her voice,
when not throttled by static, was clear or burned out,
but fierce. She gestured me into the deeper woods with
a terse wave. We have five minutes no more. Harbon
is the weakest link, but not alone. They were watching
the main exits. Stick with me. You can get to
the service road. Make any noise, they'll no. Keep your
head down, stay off the path, I nodded, voice leaden
with adrenaline. You left your name on the logs al
h my brother. She shook me off. Too many sisters, brothers, friends.
They blurred together. In the end, she shone the flashlight
back the way we came. Why I've blurted finally damned up.
Questions breaking free. Why do they do it this way?
Is it just the money? She turned on me. Iye,
shining wet, but anger not grief, power control. There's more
effort tracking money than tracking loss lives. They've been exchanging
writers for years, through flattered routes, secret drop offs and circles.
Only a few ever understand when they trade someone that
Marx has leave this one or take this one, sometimes
for debts, sometimes for what they know or what they
are willing to become. What do we do now, I asked?
She considered, get to the city up, put everything you have,
audio tape locks, Forget the police. The organization's reach as
bone deep, go higher, bigger newspapers, the right advocates, blow
up the machinery. If you want your brother, assume he's
either inside or gone. I'm sorry. The words dung more
than I thought they could. I fumbled in my pocket,
handed to the bundle of cosetts. You take these, I'll
she cut me off. No, that's not how this works.
You found it. It's your perfewed decision. If you run,
leak or fight, She regarded, the woods, face pale in
the beam. We have to go service, tunnel is nor
a third cypress over one chance. I followed as she
knife through the nettles, the woods alive with a million
and name sounds, branches breaking wind, carrying voices that might
have been ordinary or might have been warnings. We found
the tunnel short steel, robed, one encave with stones. She
dropped to her knees, paying a loose grating aside. I hesitated,
then ducked after her. The world up a shrank to
a stripe of broken minlight under the roadway. The tunnel
stank of rotten water, rust and oil. A sensory assault.
I was on hands and knees, bag scraping, a long
reassurance only in the rough presence of another human nearby.
Half Way through, Noah's thundered behind a pair of boots
on the asphalt, voices raised in what could have been pursued.
I shudder, but pushed on adrenaline overriding terror. My hands
slipped on greasy stones. The cam quarridor fretted against my ribs.
At the far end, she twisted another great loose, hauling
me up on to a strip of service road between
trees and a second empty depot lot head lights flickered beyond.
She pointed down the darkened service lane. The girl, I'll
lead them this way. You run, This is your window.
Don't look back. Before I could thank her, she was gone,
moving with the practice, vanish into the brush. Our flashlight darkened,
The boots behind us faded into distant echoes. My feet
pounded the ripple pavement, lungs full of corrosive air. My
mind shurned dozens of images all at once, the circles
glowing in the gas, the cassette taped slick was sweat,
my brother's name, echoing down rows of empty seats. When
the city lies finally welled up ahead, yellow white and indifferent,
I stopped my hands, tingled, skin buzzing hot, as if
the adrenaline at gun caustic. I slipped the messenger bag
off my shoulder, checked everything breathable and broken. Evidence and
trollman sipped tight together. I turned, scanned the woods. No
one followed. The road stretched ahead, silent except for one
distant BUSU marked. My phone vibrated a string of new messages,
this time from LEO, punctuated with you O K. Then
lines blowing out police everywhere. You won't see Netty boat
right a later one more solemn proofs already out. People
are listening. I fumbled out a breathing laugh. The events
of the last I vibrated behind my eyes. I turned
east toward the city. Proper sirens pullsed on the horizon,
but I faded into the night and nobody, again, defined
by anonymity more than by evidence. Not far from my apartment,
city lives warmed an you fu reescent diners half shutter,
the hiss of distant traffic covering any memory of the
woods in a bathroom stalled a bus terminal five miles
from Elbridge. I locked the door, thumb my fe owing
to your record, and whispered a final memo for the audiophile, proved,
secured names attached, Send to every firebrant and paper. Fearless
enough to run with it. If anyone hears this, if
it's not just me, don't take the last ride, not now.
I uploaded the recording to Leo tortrusted online account, and
finally to a news producer I only half knew don
I zipped my back, splashed my face, and stepped back
into the noise. In the lights and impatience of the city.
The lines on my pump felt burned, and from one
two minny night of clutching journal's cossettes helped stolen from
others disappearances. For a hundred yards, every passing bus seemed
to glance in my direction, none of them slowing, none
of them marked. But the feeling didn't leave that at
any given moment the world's machinery could choke a secret again.
I pressed forward through the city blocks, none but alerte.
In the last hour before sunrise, I reached my building,
the doors that could behind me see closing, not with
peace but a hell breath. In the silence of my kitchen,
I sat facing the window, the thin gray rooft of
morning yawning out the sky line. At the far end
of the block, a tremlumbertop pause breaks, sighing. I glanced down,
striped with dirt and dried blood from kneeling in tunnel mulk.
The cassettes remains it in my lap, evidence in curs both.
I looked beyond the glass to the street below, idly
cataloging the bus stops. Then my eyes snagged there, almost invisible,
beneath the swirl of old mark attacks at the base
of the tramps shelter were two of lapping circles, and
faintly a third depended like an afterthought. They've been scratched
and hurriedly freshly the mark truck me here. The last
thought roseen bidden, certain the circle was unbroken. I pressed
my forehead to the cool glass, breathing the city's noise
and grime, feeling the shape of everything that couldn't be
contained in stories or proof or even blow ties. That
was how it ended, and that is the end. Thank
you for listening, and I will see you in the
next one.