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Speaker 1: Hello, I'm welcomed stories all the time. Glad you are here.

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Let's get into it. The lights along high Way forty

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four were fracted in broken pulses. As the midnight buss

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to a halt its head, I was catching on puddles

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that dotted the gravel turn out. I waited, one sneaker

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balancing on painted lines washed nearly clean of yellow. My

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recorder felt slick in my palm, digital numbers blinking as

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I thundered away. Critual more than necessity, the kind of happened,

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since that keeps He tethered to reality that sometimes WAPs

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when you travel. At Weirdyer's. The driver, gaunt with fatigue,

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corunted a greeting that was mostly vapor in the cold,

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his hands heavy on the wheel. I tapped my fair card,

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the beep and congruously cheerful, and moved past the silent

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ticket box. Inside the bus was more sand than shape,

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the gumble of the engine, blue lid overhead panels, and

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the shifting third third of tires running over an even tarmac.

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Two passengers hunched up front, faces absorbed by half glowing phones.

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I nodded, without expecting a return. A certain type of

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passenger rides at the sire where I contact is a contry,

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neither party. Once The mail was a collage stale air

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spelled energy drink, the faintest suggestion of something earthy and

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ron The seemed to cling in corners. I made my

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way past rosa scuff final sunlight long since vanished from

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these seats. At round nineteen, my shoulder grazed the window,

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and I noticed the graffiti. Rough circulo line scratched into

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the tinto glass. Two circles, then another, overlapping in an

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uncertain figure eight that felt for reasons i'd only half admit,

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like a warning more than attack. My hand hovered over

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the mark beneath the seat. The darkness seemed deeper, the

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intrusion of my flashlight beam making it starker. There was

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something stuffed under there. Hot knocking, a rhythm that wasn't

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quite in time with the bus's motion. A crouch and

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fisted out a battle canvas backpack. As canvas was rubbed thin,

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one shoulder strapped, nearly worn through. Dirk kicked the seams.

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I glanced up on edge. Nobody was watching. The passengers ahead,

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didn't turn. I unzipped the main compartment my breath caught

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with the scent of meldew in something sharper like pencil

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shadings inside notebooks, snapped spirals, duct tape reinforcing the covers,

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a tangle of headphone cords. A few bus transfers slept

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so faded their ink was a specter of purple numbers.

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The largest notebook fell open under its own weight. Pages

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dense with slanted handwriting. As a bus took a turn,

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the words seemed to shiver beneath the beam of my flashlight.

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March none, I saw them again. Two seats up. Don't

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trust the quiet ones if you ride too far, they

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notice got on after Applewood, never made a sound, Circles

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on the glass, always at the back. My wrist trembled

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a little as I leafed through more pages. Most of

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the entrant devolved into listings, bus numbers, times, cryptic warnings,

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never sit at the back, not after the lights go,

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Sometimes just the phrase the other passengers. Some pages were

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rip halfway through, crossed up violently. The handwriting compressed from

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all daily frustration to desperate etching, as if the author

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had written while the bus rattled over potholes, or worse,

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a gust of cold swept through. I shivered, but the

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windows were sealed shut gums of black rest due holding

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them still. From somewhere down the center, I came the

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low drawing of murmured voices. But when I looked up,

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the rancy showed nothing but the blue glow of screens.

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I snapped the notebook shut heartaekeeping always found something on

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the Elbera's line, I said vos, trying for rise. I

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raised the recorder to my mouth, documenting the moment for

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the benefit of my hypothetical late night listeners. Outside the

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force pressed ride up to the shoulder trunks splintered by

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the passing lens of the bus's head lights. Then the

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vehicle rocked harder than before, pothole or perhaps a shift

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in the grade. I clutched the bag mney bump in

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a cold metal post of seat twenty. Between the flicker

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of outside landscape and the sullen neon side the well

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seen thinner. The distance between here and there, solid and uncertain,

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shrunked to the length of a handful of occupied seats

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in the back half of a midnight bus. Even the

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driver was just a hunch silhouet at the front brackets

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of reflection pressed against the glass. My pole filled the

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gaps between the engine's monotonous arm. We pressed on deeper

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into the dark, each drizzle streaked window giving way to

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the expanse of woods and the glint of the next

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small town as it emerged in the distant Celbridge, where

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people said the night lines ended for good. In most

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strangers eyes and the voice who chased down small ten

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myths and urban legends. Hauling Stone Away was out of

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static and boredom for an indie podcast, buried somewhere under

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society and culture. That was the plan, anyway, until all

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the sores started pointing to the same cold echo. People

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disappear in Elbridge, some quietly, some with a bit of

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drama of weather reports and search parties, but most often

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with nothing but a ghost trail of tickets and unanswered texts,

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a most heath barely detectable humming. Beneath the ordinary home

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was a narrow apartment above a boarded up boga wall's

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gardened with clippings, corosary receipts, overlapped faux coopered missing persons reports.

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Lisa thought, while aged nineteen, last seen at Elbridge bus terminal.

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Alan Khym seventeen, texted to be home soon and never

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walked in the door. Ellowed post its, some curling at

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the edges, clustered around a handrawn map where the bus

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lines webb from cities center out toward Elberge, and then

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then too a single hesitating line. The night run. The

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grind wasn't to grind so much as a coping mechanism.

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I split days into chunks, field into views at gas

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stations and transit terminals, cataloging who'd seen what and how

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many had simply stopped caring. At night the audio edits

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we became a fortification, mixing backgrounds until the hit of

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bad cable faded into the thrum of an old city

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at rest. Most of my stories had been about lost pets,

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embarrassing local legends, and were only in spirit, usually light

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on existential threat. But the pile of detail grew heavier

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after my brother vanished. He left a goodbye on ive

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was mel a one off catch up. I'll call you

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when I get in see you soon. Never arrived, never

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called again. After weeks of stale waiting, the despatcher shrouked.

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They all do, is Eldridge, What do you expect? At

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two A m four official forms. Voluntary absence had to suffice,

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but I archived everything, CCTV grabs, time stamped bus rosters.

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Even Tip called him from old classmates, convinced he'd only

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gone underground. There was a pattern. I told myself something

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just below the official bore in my audio diaries, I

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let the mask slip. If the records are just amazed

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with no exit, maybe the answerer is off the books,

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not shut in depression, not agoraphobic compulsion. Each missing person

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was another stone pursing my chest, another name Tip to

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the wall. The transit network was the city's circuitary system,

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a patch for both intricate and fallible stations built old

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commuters by the thousands seat Rushio. Most only cared about delays,

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not the after midnight lines with irregular schedules and needigible ridership.

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Alberge's tiny depot, framed by sodium vapor and sheep fencing,

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stood as a relicave place, with the floors polished, weakly reflected,

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ghostly outlines of forgotten crowds. I carried a microphone rig

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that looked military issue. In half the time got me

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double takes from drivers. They were a superstitious crew shaped

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by years of night shifts. On the record, they'd speak

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in that mild idiocy shore words. Stuff happens no more

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so than anywhere else off the record. Eyes took on

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a nervous clint. Try working after dark out there. You

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hear things, said one sidelong in a booth named to

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calf peeled off. Doesn't mean you believe it. I walked

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the Alberge terminal with my gear, bags slung high, shoes,

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grape and tile, missing persons, Posters hung crooked on a

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wall on yellow with age plastic edges curled and lifted

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by time. Each was a little editorial Have you seen

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with a phone number that buzzed up to nowhere? I

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recorded the story the wave voices bounced in the silence,

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the drought footsteps of a tired janitor changing out garbage bags.

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He glanced sideways when the recorder glimmered red. It's not

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just kids either, he muttered, focusing on a stubborn clump

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of chewing gum. Whole lives walk in and don't walk

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out only after iurs it's the night lines. Everybody knows it,

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but it's not theirs to talk about enough. I swung

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the microphone out of his face, Silence pressed in thick

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as wool. The office workers, when present, left by seven.

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Remaining staff offered nothing but the same kend responses. If pressed,

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they chucked the door or turn away, as if the

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line between trans at law and public safety was just

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another lot filing cabinet. My recordings, when playback in the

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small eyves, sounded like confessions mine or someone else's I

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couldn't tell. I would murmur thoughts to the recorder while

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scanning online rumors surviving each night with microwave noodles and

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too much caffeine. Every so often though something from the

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regular weary rhythm with joga memory, my last argument with

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my brother, his voice flat and tied, both of us

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too proud and too stubborn. The ache was just manageable

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if I pretended all missing people were obstructions, narrative beats,

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not wounds. But Elbridge had a way of scratching at winds,

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making the impossible scene not just probable, but pending, and

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every so often impossible to ignore. Back in the static

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gray of my kitchen, I made a list of names,

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bus numbers, dates, folk corresponding to disappearances reported along the

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elberdra spurad sheet scrolled past my exhausted eyes, but real

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clues stubbornly refused to line up. No easy answers, no

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neat connections except for a narrow window, no record of

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transaction or digital trace. After midnight from those who'd bought tickets.

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Family members uploaded frantic Facebook statuses. The language patterns were

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disturbingly similar. Almost there stecks just past the woods. Some

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mentioned odd folk or a sense of being watched before

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their frig went dead in a window folded by night.

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I played back interviews with relatives. A mother described her

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son's word texts mentioning a stranger who wasn't on the cameras.

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An older woman remembered her sister saying she felt wrong

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every time the bus neared Elbridge. The store was overlapped,

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but no one described the saying face twice, just the

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same abstract presence lurking, where the bus windows darkened and

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the world grew indistinct, the overlapping sir or scraped and

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the bus window lingered in my mind. On a whim,

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I scatured forms for local graffiti signals arroed on a

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page devoted to regional superstitions. Someone posted a photo same circles,

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tagged a bad luck sign avoid Another reply means wrong

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end of town, seen it everywherek it goes missing. That night, restless,

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I snuck into the deepest parking yacht after ires phone

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camera stuttering as I scanned the rows of buses. Loud silence.

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My sneak displayed puddles into oily galaxies beneath sodium lambs.

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I checked windows with careful hands, kept my lens tight

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to the glass. Only the Elbridge night in its carried

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the ched circles only in the lower rear window, always

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at the same spots seat nineteen morning runs were clean.

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Sometimes in the stale confines of the night buses. My

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own reflection caught and multiplied in the panes, just blauze,

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sometimes a momentary second jatto behind my own. Once or

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twice I heard steps echoed through the yard, sudden and sharp,

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but found no source. That sense of being watched was

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an old trick to mine. Played but here half recognized,

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half dreaded. It felt less like imagination and more like preview.

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Piercing through bus manifests and security footage had collected one

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d Dell crystallized at least half of those missing since

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March had entered or exited at or immediately near that

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mark's heed at the back, half given names and despatch

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of logs argued the same In a blue flicker of

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my monitor at the pattern held an accusation sketch in

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circles and seat numbers nets bled into one another. My

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sleeper casualty. Each dreamed attempt to catalog the pattern only

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led to more questions anchoring staff or sending room among

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us in silence. The density of dread was cumulative. I

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scribbled my own warning on to a post it stuck

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it above my desk. If he run, run forward, not back.

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I'd never liked night buses. They always felt less like

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vehicles than thresholds, especially now, lines between ordinary and uncanny,

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crumpling with everynee detail. Still each night, Richell carried me

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back through the Elberge stores as if solvender might save

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my brother. Retroactively. I met one of the old hands

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behind the wheel after handing the supervisor for a local

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color sound bite. Cherry Nane tad Crack looked like he'd

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contained more stores than shifts. We talked, does he chet

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hire pressure at his layer stop? Engine idling low. People

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make up ghost stuff, he said, Gaze straight in the

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ox of my my cord, and not everything's ghosts, not

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around here. I drive as sea faces, half of him, tired,

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half of him lost. Every once in a while, you

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see someone twice in one night, but not the way

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you remember him. I switched off the record a light.

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He looked at me sideways, almost smiling, then said quieter.

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Sometimes I get back to the depot and can't reckon

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the memory of the trip, like minutes went missing, or

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a face stands out, But then it's gone riders that

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look wrong in the mirrors. Ye know what I mean.

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He fumbled in his jacket and passed me a bat

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at USB stick found this on the seat after one

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00:11:35,559 --> 00:11:38,279
of the night's security footage, but my supervisor didn't want

235
00:11:38,279 --> 00:11:41,039
it locked. Maybe you'll see something I missed. My breath

236
00:11:41,080 --> 00:11:44,360
quivered with anticipation. I pressed for more, but he shut down,

237
00:11:44,480 --> 00:11:47,759
but stors hissing clothes. The next trip, his seat was empty.

238
00:11:47,799 --> 00:11:50,879
Another driver had taken his shift. Name not listed back

239
00:11:50,919 --> 00:11:53,200
at my kitchen table, might take friend Leo sat beside me,

240
00:11:53,279 --> 00:11:55,200
hunched over a bat at that top, humming with fans.

241
00:11:55,919 --> 00:11:59,519
We booted up the footage. The screens stuttered, time stamp skipping,

242
00:11:59,600 --> 00:12:02,759
grinding through blocks of static like an old VHS. The

243
00:12:02,840 --> 00:12:05,879
camera panned a clean sweep of the inside, mostly empty,

244
00:12:05,960 --> 00:12:09,480
but then in quarter second flashes seats appeared, filled, faces blurred,

245
00:12:09,519 --> 00:12:12,240
shifting pairs of ice sparkling white where passengers should have

246
00:12:12,240 --> 00:12:15,440
been sleeping or watching the night crowbi Frame by frame,

247
00:12:15,519 --> 00:12:18,120
Sometimes there was a scorny form in seat nineteen, sometimes

248
00:12:18,200 --> 00:12:20,720
just an empty window, the mark only visible when angle

249
00:12:20,759 --> 00:12:24,759
and light heeded just so Leah whistled through his teeth corrupted.

250
00:12:24,840 --> 00:12:26,720
They tried to wipe the file, but whoever did it

251
00:12:26,720 --> 00:12:29,120
was lazy. See these gaps. The minutes are gone. There

252
00:12:29,120 --> 00:12:31,960
are breaks after key stops too. The notebook from the

253
00:12:31,960 --> 00:12:35,879
battered backback became my constant companion. It's desperate, spiraling warning

254
00:12:35,879 --> 00:12:39,039
scotch my thoughts. Don't trust the conductor. There is another

255
00:12:39,080 --> 00:12:42,159
door driven by and saw me and dread. I mapped

256
00:12:42,159 --> 00:12:44,440
out the stretch of blacked out highway mentioned in the journal.

257
00:12:45,000 --> 00:12:47,840
Street lights vanished for three exits, forced and kempt and

258
00:12:47,879 --> 00:12:50,720
wild on either side. I had past it off in daylight,

259
00:12:50,799 --> 00:12:54,240
but night ungrainy video. It was a ribbon of nothing. Finally,

260
00:12:54,279 --> 00:12:56,759
I boarded the RUD again, the journal, USB and new

261
00:12:56,759 --> 00:13:00,000
recorder stashed in my bag. When my phone vibrated, I

262
00:13:00,000 --> 00:13:02,320
I ignored it. I planned to ride the run from

263
00:13:02,360 --> 00:13:04,240
the city out, counting the stops and track in the

264
00:13:04,240 --> 00:13:07,720
missing minutes. Twenty minutes. Then the clock on my phone drifted.

265
00:13:08,399 --> 00:13:11,200
The GPS location floated uncertain, some more miles off. My

266
00:13:11,240 --> 00:13:14,000
truck was nowhere at all. The bus interior walked, which

267
00:13:14,000 --> 00:13:16,840
shadows shifting as if waiting for a queue. I paced

268
00:13:16,840 --> 00:13:19,399
back to seat nineteen and crouched, lifting the seat general

269
00:13:19,399 --> 00:13:22,279
pages held open by my flashlight beam. The entries had

270
00:13:22,279 --> 00:13:25,559
alluded to a key. I groped for something, nerves buzzing,

271
00:13:25,759 --> 00:13:28,080
but found nothing except a residue sticky to the touch.

272
00:13:28,879 --> 00:13:31,559
My flashlight picked out a bus transfer stop. Colors leached

273
00:13:31,559 --> 00:13:34,639
out the tickets, sporting oddscript, not quite any language I knew.

274
00:13:35,200 --> 00:13:37,919
Right then, the driver's was defonated through the speakers, as words,

275
00:13:37,960 --> 00:13:40,200
rounding every vowl with a threat he didn't care to hide.

276
00:13:40,200 --> 00:13:43,519
Next stop, Albert, if you're still here. Outside, trees pressed

277
00:13:43,519 --> 00:13:46,679
closer than I remembered. Dartas swelled in the aisles as

278
00:13:46,720 --> 00:13:50,000
if the lights themselves recoiled, my own reflection ghosted in

279
00:13:50,000 --> 00:13:52,679
the glass, marred by the overlapping circles, cold in the window.

280
00:13:53,200 --> 00:13:55,120
At two in the morning, as I poured over my

281
00:13:55,120 --> 00:13:58,200
second note copy, while the world outside blurred, my phone pinged.

282
00:13:58,200 --> 00:14:01,600
Once a message request from a unknown the preview line

283
00:14:01,600 --> 00:14:04,480
stopped my breath called found you meet me. I borrowed

284
00:14:04,519 --> 00:14:06,879
Leo's living room, this time barricading the door with a

285
00:14:06,919 --> 00:14:10,000
box of hard drives for extra caution. Across one speaker,

286
00:14:10,000 --> 00:14:13,039
a voice message fluttered with feedback, then settled. A woman's whisper,

287
00:14:13,200 --> 00:14:16,399
accented by tiredness and something sharper. This is ell at

288
00:14:16,440 --> 00:14:19,960
the rest garbled into static. She sounded younger than I expected.

289
00:14:20,559 --> 00:14:22,559
I wrote the journal. You don't know me, but I

290
00:14:22,639 --> 00:14:24,919
follow because I had to, because they watch us too.

291
00:14:24,960 --> 00:14:26,840
They ride with us. They always ride with us. The

292
00:14:26,879 --> 00:14:29,320
circles they aren't for the driver's offer us. It signals

293
00:14:29,440 --> 00:14:31,879
used safe, who's owed something back or who lets them on?

294
00:14:32,039 --> 00:14:34,440
Get out, move seats next time, don't look back, don't

295
00:14:34,519 --> 00:14:37,519
let yourself be candied. Then the feet garbled again, breaking

296
00:14:37,559 --> 00:14:40,200
into digital screech that resolved for a heartbeat into her

297
00:14:40,200 --> 00:14:43,879
hiss word they see you. I fumbled instinctively switching the

298
00:14:43,919 --> 00:14:47,080
recorder to an isolated track, but her final message cut off,

299
00:14:47,120 --> 00:14:50,000
as if a hand had ripped it away outside Leo

300
00:14:50,080 --> 00:14:52,000
was in the kitchen. I didn't move, just reeblade the

301
00:14:52,000 --> 00:14:55,039
cadence of her fear back on the notebook. Another pattern

302
00:14:55,080 --> 00:14:58,399
tugged at my thoughts. Every corrupt as surveillance state, each

303
00:14:58,480 --> 00:15:01,759
unexplained gap, every error logs fell within a block of

304
00:15:01,759 --> 00:15:04,200
shifts matching a single despatch as Eyres, an old name

305
00:15:04,320 --> 00:15:07,879
Harbin stamped sloply but repeatedly. I flipped through bus logs

306
00:15:07,879 --> 00:15:11,080
and cross checks signatures enough times to be sure, always

307
00:15:11,080 --> 00:15:14,639
present when something weird surfaced. One missing person's last text

308
00:15:14,679 --> 00:15:16,759
reference to a guy behind the glass, staring like I

309
00:15:16,879 --> 00:15:20,000
was wrung, driven by something between duty and obsession. I

310
00:15:20,080 --> 00:15:22,639
left the apartment and made my way voice recorder clutched

311
00:15:22,639 --> 00:15:25,480
against my chest to the transit office behind Albridge's gray depo.

312
00:15:26,080 --> 00:15:28,360
The staff lounge was a mausoleum at this ire, computer

313
00:15:28,399 --> 00:15:31,320
screens showing only the doll glow of locked terminals. I

314
00:15:31,360 --> 00:15:33,679
took the long way, tracing my rope within certain steps

315
00:15:33,720 --> 00:15:37,279
until I found the despatch window there behind the fog glass.

316
00:15:37,279 --> 00:15:40,080
A thin man sat, white shirt, no badge, stucking behind

317
00:15:40,120 --> 00:15:44,360
paper sacks as if expecting confrontation. Harbin scratched on his clipboard.

318
00:15:45,000 --> 00:15:47,879
I cleared my throat. He froze. I was claudy over

319
00:15:47,879 --> 00:15:50,840
thick glasses. He knows something about the night runs. Heering

320
00:15:50,879 --> 00:15:53,440
the logs and the missing tapes, and they I tried

321
00:15:53,440 --> 00:15:55,799
to keep my voice flat, unaccusing, but the weight of

322
00:15:55,840 --> 00:16:00,080
evidence made my words brittle. He sneered, thin lipped, didn't down.

323
00:16:00,879 --> 00:16:02,840
I pressed a recorder to the slot in the glass,

324
00:16:03,039 --> 00:16:04,480
and a door at the end of the whole clicked,

325
00:16:04,480 --> 00:16:08,279
opened loud to liberate. Two men in dark uniforms drifted in.

326
00:16:08,879 --> 00:16:12,320
Not security, at least not staff. I'd ever seen Badger's

327
00:16:12,360 --> 00:16:15,840
glinting rom They barked orders. My brain skipped adrenaline in

328
00:16:15,879 --> 00:16:19,799
shirting forocus. They wrenched my arm, not too gently, pulling

329
00:16:19,840 --> 00:16:22,679
the record free. Their expressions clinically blank as they rifled

330
00:16:22,679 --> 00:16:25,320
my back and pocketed the notebook. We'll need to talk

331
00:16:25,320 --> 00:16:28,480
to you somewhere else, one said, no inflection, It dropped

332
00:16:28,519 --> 00:16:31,840
the act. No recording equipment allowed, Not for you. He's

333
00:16:31,840 --> 00:16:35,399
a trouble maker. The despatcher spat always snooping. They marched

334
00:16:35,440 --> 00:16:38,200
me down an interminable corridor, out of the rear emergency exit.

335
00:16:38,240 --> 00:16:40,679
Everything blowed by humiliation and something cold to fear that

336
00:16:40,720 --> 00:16:43,759
felt old and freshly sharpened. The lot behind the deeper

337
00:16:43,799 --> 00:16:46,000
was empty but for the shimmer of one late besideling

338
00:16:46,000 --> 00:16:49,080
by the curb, its rear windows burned with fresh graffiti,

339
00:16:49,200 --> 00:16:52,240
the overlapping circles glinting against the soft orange flood of

340
00:16:52,240 --> 00:16:56,039
the street lamp. The door shuddered closed. The engine's hum

341
00:16:56,080 --> 00:16:59,480
was the only heartbeat. The figures hustled back inside, leaving

342
00:16:59,519 --> 00:17:01,480
me alone in the sodium light emptiness. As the night

343
00:17:01,480 --> 00:17:04,559
bus weezed off into limitless dark destination, outrage, no longer

344
00:17:04,559 --> 00:17:07,880
accepting passengers, The hollow ache in my chest vibrated with

345
00:17:07,960 --> 00:17:10,519
the force of everything unresolved, the question unanswered. A brother

346
00:17:10,599 --> 00:17:13,279
nedd returned, the echoing dare of another ride out of reach.

347
00:17:14,119 --> 00:17:16,240
Some were just beyond the halo of light, the woods

348
00:17:16,240 --> 00:17:19,359
and the night passed close in the distance. Another bus

349
00:17:19,359 --> 00:17:22,319
passed by, its windows shining purely black, showing nothing but

350
00:17:22,400 --> 00:17:24,519
threat and the pale glimmer of circles. Left. But those

351
00:17:24,519 --> 00:17:27,599
who knew too much and still vanished anyway. The silence

352
00:17:27,599 --> 00:17:29,799
of the lot pressed against my ears sharp a somehow

353
00:17:29,839 --> 00:17:32,279
after the chatter of authority, in the bright, antiseptic light

354
00:17:32,359 --> 00:17:35,160
of the deeper halls, I stood a moving feeling, the

355
00:17:35,160 --> 00:17:38,160
grain of cold concrete biting through my shoes. My hands

356
00:17:38,160 --> 00:17:40,279
shook as I robed. My wrists were a security man's

357
00:17:40,279 --> 00:17:43,279
grip had left it tingling and sore. For a long minute,

358
00:17:43,359 --> 00:17:45,480
I did nothing, et ceter try to gather myself, fist

359
00:17:45,559 --> 00:17:47,680
in my pockets, with imprint of the recorders still echoing

360
00:17:47,680 --> 00:17:50,400
alarm my palm. The night seemed to hold its breath,

361
00:17:50,519 --> 00:17:52,799
waiting for my next move, as if even the small

362
00:17:52,839 --> 00:17:55,880
animals in the underbrush had agreed to freeze. I forced

363
00:17:55,880 --> 00:17:57,559
myself to put one foot in front of the other,

364
00:17:57,680 --> 00:17:59,920
heading back towards the main road, my eyes darting to

365
00:18:00,079 --> 00:18:02,960
the side fence, half depecting another dark uniform figured to

366
00:18:03,000 --> 00:18:05,440
melt out of the shadows and haul me back. The

367
00:18:05,480 --> 00:18:07,559
boss that had just left shrunk in the distance, red

368
00:18:07,599 --> 00:18:10,519
tail lights flickering the overlapping circles, catching the lost glimpse

369
00:18:10,519 --> 00:18:12,759
of the street light, almost like the mark was watching me,

370
00:18:13,160 --> 00:18:15,759
or I was supposed to be afraid. The message was

371
00:18:15,799 --> 00:18:19,480
clear enough. I glanced down the crack sidewalk, orienting myself

372
00:18:19,519 --> 00:18:21,640
by habit, letting the street names roll through my head

373
00:18:21,720 --> 00:18:25,880
as a distraction. Railroad avenue stretching thin, leading out toward

374
00:18:25,920 --> 00:18:29,000
the doughnut shoppen, next to nothing else. My ride home

375
00:18:29,000 --> 00:18:31,640
was theoretically waiting, but after an eject like that, getting

376
00:18:31,680 --> 00:18:35,039
back on girt felt dangerous. My phone buzzed in my pocket,

377
00:18:35,079 --> 00:18:40,279
Maybe LEO, maybe not. I checked it instinctively two misnotifications.

378
00:18:40,960 --> 00:18:43,480
First was a routine banking alert. The next and unknown

379
00:18:43,559 --> 00:18:45,839
number a blood thumbnailt in one word sent by a

380
00:18:45,880 --> 00:18:49,960
text that already reads expired walking. My thumb hovered over

381
00:18:50,000 --> 00:18:52,799
the keep it, but I didn't reply. Paranoid pressed height

382
00:18:52,839 --> 00:18:57,680
against rational thought. Messages could be tracked, conversations could be overheard.

383
00:18:58,440 --> 00:19:01,559
I didn't need another warning, but the words stuck echoing

384
00:19:01,559 --> 00:19:04,160
in my head as I heard my footsteps. I passed

385
00:19:04,160 --> 00:19:06,359
the perimeter of the deeper sucking night ifrough my tee,

386
00:19:06,440 --> 00:19:08,440
feeling awake in the weight that only fear or bitness

387
00:19:08,440 --> 00:19:11,079
can produce. By the time the horizon hinted at the

388
00:19:11,079 --> 00:19:13,440
first pale lines of dawn, I was three neighborhoods away.

389
00:19:13,480 --> 00:19:15,599
Every inch farther from Elbert, bringing a shallow sense of

390
00:19:15,640 --> 00:19:19,039
reprief A string of chainling fencing the kind sacking beneath

391
00:19:19,039 --> 00:19:21,680
the weight of rusty no trespassing signs ran beside me.

392
00:19:22,319 --> 00:19:25,720
The bus rumbled past, heading the wrong way. Mercifully, I

393
00:19:25,759 --> 00:19:27,960
waited for it to disappear before ducking into a corner

394
00:19:28,000 --> 00:19:32,000
bodega head dam. The cashier didn't ask questions. I bought

395
00:19:32,000 --> 00:19:34,000
a bottle of cheap water and thumb through my wallet,

396
00:19:34,160 --> 00:19:37,359
mine clattering with phantom echoes. As I scanned the shelves

397
00:19:37,400 --> 00:19:39,920
of faded gun packets and candy bars. My gaze flaked

398
00:19:39,920 --> 00:19:42,039
across a strip of local broadshets clipped to the counter

399
00:19:42,759 --> 00:19:44,720
near the bottom. I head line shrieked up from the

400
00:19:44,720 --> 00:19:47,079
blow of text up which night line closed for repairs.

401
00:19:47,759 --> 00:19:49,640
I thought the urge to laugh, the sounds stifled in

402
00:19:49,680 --> 00:19:53,799
my throat. Even the newspapers co operated. My hands trembled

403
00:19:53,799 --> 00:19:56,079
slightly as I fit coins into the paphon by the door,

404
00:19:56,160 --> 00:19:59,200
diling ly or by muscle memory. Hey, I said, when

405
00:19:59,240 --> 00:20:01,160
he picked up his void. I'm sure if the eye

406
00:20:01,160 --> 00:20:04,519
are justified being angry O word hugh out hias no

407
00:20:04,640 --> 00:20:08,039
need to clarified the meaning. Yeah, I lost em, I replied,

408
00:20:08,160 --> 00:20:10,240
stirring at the shelves, as if some product label held

409
00:20:10,279 --> 00:20:13,079
the seeker cot to all things. You need a ride,

410
00:20:13,599 --> 00:20:16,079
I bit my lip. I'll make it. Stay out of

411
00:20:16,119 --> 00:20:18,079
sight to night. I'll come by tomorrow. Don't open the

412
00:20:18,079 --> 00:20:20,920
door unless you recognize my knock. There was a pause.

413
00:20:21,720 --> 00:20:23,359
He didn't tape over the good file on the U

414
00:20:23,400 --> 00:20:26,240
s B, did you, I smiled, more for comfort than wit.

415
00:20:26,920 --> 00:20:30,000
Of course not. It's uploaded everywhere, just in case. He

416
00:20:30,079 --> 00:20:33,440
exhaled relief audibly through the receiver. I wish you'd call

417
00:20:33,440 --> 00:20:36,480
the copse. They're not going to help, I said, tiredness

418
00:20:36,480 --> 00:20:39,079
thickening my tongue. They part of the script may be

419
00:20:39,200 --> 00:20:41,920
not the same act, but close enough. Leon new when

420
00:20:41,960 --> 00:20:44,880
not to argue. All right, crashier if you want, or

421
00:20:44,920 --> 00:20:46,720
at least let me know you'll get in a few hours.

422
00:20:47,440 --> 00:20:50,359
I'll check in. I hung up, spun the phone cord slowly.

423
00:20:50,960 --> 00:20:53,559
The brief human contact steadied me. Even in the fluorescence

424
00:20:53,559 --> 00:20:56,480
of the Boca, surrounded by isles smelling faintly of cleaning agent,

425
00:20:56,559 --> 00:20:59,839
the floor scuff white by ten thousand careless customers. Mari

426
00:21:00,000 --> 00:21:02,079
reflection in a window glass was a ghost between snack

427
00:21:02,119 --> 00:21:05,519
displays and advertisements for cheap cigarettes. When I parted the

428
00:21:05,519 --> 00:21:07,920
past a curtain and stepped outside again, the restless urged

429
00:21:07,920 --> 00:21:10,559
to pace overtook me. It took nearly and iou to

430
00:21:10,599 --> 00:21:13,599
walk back toward home, partly by choice, partly because the

431
00:21:13,599 --> 00:21:15,519
bus stops now struck me as stage as bill for

432
00:21:15,599 --> 00:21:18,440
someone else's drama. My limbs ached and my mind went

433
00:21:18,480 --> 00:21:20,960
in circles, reviewing every detail of the despatch office, the

434
00:21:21,000 --> 00:21:23,079
faces of the men who dragged me out, the almost

435
00:21:23,160 --> 00:21:26,160
bored indifference of harping behind the glass. Here is in

436
00:21:26,200 --> 00:21:28,640
my head, nord at the facts, the journals, the messages,

437
00:21:28,720 --> 00:21:30,960
the despatchers. I was lining up with lost footage and

438
00:21:31,000 --> 00:21:33,680
skip records, the circles only in the night buses, the

439
00:21:33,759 --> 00:21:36,119
list of names that never made it home. That was

440
00:21:36,119 --> 00:21:39,839
the arithmetic, I told myself, Nothing supernatural, just a chain

441
00:21:39,880 --> 00:21:42,200
of ugly little acts, repeated with enough notes that every

442
00:21:42,200 --> 00:21:45,599
body's responsibility blurred. I slipped up the back steps of

443
00:21:45,640 --> 00:21:47,759
my building, using the key with care not to rattle

444
00:21:47,759 --> 00:21:50,640
the metal. My apartment was stuffy with heat. The window

445
00:21:50,720 --> 00:21:52,759
left shut in my rush to leave, and I flicked

446
00:21:52,759 --> 00:21:55,240
in the fan with a sigh. I checked twice for

447
00:21:55,279 --> 00:21:57,680
anything missing. Recorder go on, but my back up drive

448
00:21:57,759 --> 00:22:00,799
sat beneath a pile of notebooks. I exhaled for real,

449
00:22:00,880 --> 00:22:03,359
this time, letting tension leak from my shoulders as I

450
00:22:03,359 --> 00:22:06,359
locked the door and collapsed onto the bed. Sleep didn't come,

451
00:22:06,480 --> 00:22:10,200
but exhaustion took over. The city buzzed outside, the noise comforting,

452
00:22:10,240 --> 00:22:12,920
now a reminder that most people's mysteries started and ended

453
00:22:12,960 --> 00:22:15,839
much smaller. When I opened my eyes again, the angle

454
00:22:15,880 --> 00:22:18,200
of late morning sunlight carved lines across the wall, map

455
00:22:18,279 --> 00:22:21,079
slicing the routes to Albridge and to abstract geometry. I

456
00:22:21,200 --> 00:22:24,759
checked my phone, No messages, nothing new except the mispuss

457
00:22:24,759 --> 00:22:27,240
from Leo and a single notification from a service I

458
00:22:27,279 --> 00:22:29,480
didn't remember, signing up for a bus arrival or at

459
00:22:29,480 --> 00:22:32,680
Elbridge line scheduled twelve four a m. The thing was

460
00:22:32,759 --> 00:22:35,759
the line had been shut from maintenance. My heart thump

461
00:22:35,799 --> 00:22:40,079
givesprom's marching along my arms. I disabled the notification reluctantly,

462
00:22:40,240 --> 00:22:42,200
or where I was likely being watched through means i'd

463
00:22:42,240 --> 00:22:45,640
never understand. I swept the room, checked my laptop, trace

464
00:22:45,680 --> 00:22:48,359
the path of my steps back to the apartment. Nothing

465
00:22:48,400 --> 00:22:51,680
made sense. There was an impulse run, disappear, leave the

466
00:22:51,720 --> 00:22:54,599
hunt to some one else. The urge drained away almost

467
00:22:54,599 --> 00:22:58,039
at once. Instead, I poured coffee and opened the browser.

468
00:22:58,680 --> 00:23:02,039
News on the Elbridge lines close was already old forums

469
00:23:02,039 --> 00:23:05,000
buzzed with speculation routine repairs or budget cuts, or a

470
00:23:05,119 --> 00:23:08,319
safety event no one dared to fine. The subreditts, usually

471
00:23:08,359 --> 00:23:11,079
a source of quippy cynicism, were quieter than I ever seen.

472
00:23:11,680 --> 00:23:14,640
For as about missing people hung limply unanswered, marked as

473
00:23:14,680 --> 00:23:18,319
aloft by mozitte request of local law enforcement. Whisper networks

474
00:23:18,319 --> 00:23:21,039
remained alive in texts, however, messages passed, long fees and

475
00:23:21,079 --> 00:23:24,039
side channels stay off. The last run only right daytime.

476
00:23:24,160 --> 00:23:26,960
It don't sit near the back. And always there was

477
00:23:27,000 --> 00:23:29,960
the circle. With nothing else to direct my focus except

478
00:23:29,960 --> 00:23:32,319
my own obsessive schemes. I opened the left of a

479
00:23:32,359 --> 00:23:36,160
browser taboff webb chatter about the overlapping circles. Here the

480
00:23:36,200 --> 00:23:40,079
speculation was more feverish theories about secret societies, initiation rights,

481
00:23:40,200 --> 00:23:45,000
government experiments, even supernatural explanations. Usually I would sift these

482
00:23:45,000 --> 00:23:47,599
for humor and resonance, for the coincidence that sometimes hid

483
00:23:47,640 --> 00:23:50,000
a core of truth to day as zeroed in on

484
00:23:50,039 --> 00:23:52,359
the user names who posted more than once, threading between

485
00:23:52,359 --> 00:23:55,920
mythology and something more credible. On one message board, someone

486
00:23:56,000 --> 00:23:58,920
named Lulin Lawry posted a series of time stamps, each

487
00:23:58,960 --> 00:24:01,480
corresponding to winger feety circles had been cleaned off worre

488
00:24:01,480 --> 00:24:04,400
etched over. In the comments, a user named back at

489
00:24:04,480 --> 00:24:07,400
nineteen replied, cleaning doesn't matter, they mark new ones. It's

490
00:24:07,400 --> 00:24:09,440
always for some one. If you see two circles sit

491
00:24:09,519 --> 00:24:12,519
up front, if there is free, don't get on. Something

492
00:24:12,519 --> 00:24:15,160
about the exchange felt rehearse to transmitted for an audience

493
00:24:15,240 --> 00:24:18,119
rather than a direct response. I opened an off fine

494
00:24:18,160 --> 00:24:21,200
man tracing old bus routes. Using the dates and times

495
00:24:21,200 --> 00:24:23,720
cross reference from both posts. In my own field notes,

496
00:24:23,880 --> 00:24:26,799
I compiled a pattern of locations. Most were on the

497
00:24:26,880 --> 00:24:29,559
night runs, and when square is lined up, there was

498
00:24:29,599 --> 00:24:31,920
always a missing person logged within forty eight hours of

499
00:24:31,920 --> 00:24:34,160
the new circles appearing on a bus or in one case,

500
00:24:34,279 --> 00:24:37,799
at an otherwise unremarkable suburban stop. I studied the latest

501
00:24:37,839 --> 00:24:40,880
journal scan I'd say before the original was seized. The

502
00:24:40,920 --> 00:24:43,720
author's drawings had started as bus and tiers, rows of seats,

503
00:24:43,799 --> 00:24:46,880
crewe block people with circular heads, always shadowed in the rear.

504
00:24:47,599 --> 00:24:50,359
Later sketches devolved outlines of the night forest, the lights

505
00:24:50,359 --> 00:24:54,400
blotted out a triangle overlaying two circles. In one alarming scroll,

506
00:24:54,839 --> 00:24:58,039
someone had written, not police dispatch, not driver's other management,

507
00:24:58,160 --> 00:25:01,319
only at night, never alone never. My memory retraced the

508
00:25:01,359 --> 00:25:03,960
desperate voice in the last message, the clitch breaking her

509
00:25:04,000 --> 00:25:07,200
warning into I wondered if she was safe, whether her

510
00:25:07,200 --> 00:25:09,640
own compulsion to document had driven her deeper into danger,

511
00:25:09,720 --> 00:25:12,440
or somehow at the other side. Again, the need for

512
00:25:12,480 --> 00:25:15,519
real evidence pressed inside my skull. I scrolled through my

513
00:25:15,559 --> 00:25:18,480
safe files, then checked online for anything new under Harbin's name.

514
00:25:19,000 --> 00:25:21,799
A search turned up nothing official, not even basic employment

515
00:25:21,839 --> 00:25:25,079
records outside transit shift locks. But on a private forum

516
00:25:25,119 --> 00:25:27,880
frequented by retired transit staff, some one had asked any

517
00:25:27,880 --> 00:25:31,039
one seen Harbin from the old Knight descolately heredies on permanently,

518
00:25:31,200 --> 00:25:34,519
but no one told us why, no replies I through.

519
00:25:34,559 --> 00:25:36,839
I did this together with the U s B security footage,

520
00:25:36,920 --> 00:25:39,720
notes from the journal, the observations from drivers, my own

521
00:25:39,759 --> 00:25:42,920
sense of a knees, my plan formed in fractured steps

522
00:25:43,079 --> 00:25:45,599
locate the source of the despatch signals. Tried to identify

523
00:25:45,599 --> 00:25:48,720
the full cycle of marked buses, get an unbroken surveillance file.

524
00:25:49,319 --> 00:25:52,440
All felt impossible and necessary in equal measure. With no

525
00:25:52,559 --> 00:25:55,079
recorder but my phone close at hand and Leo's old

526
00:25:55,079 --> 00:25:57,839
camporder clunky clicke thing that stored actual tape, I prepared

527
00:25:57,880 --> 00:26:01,039
for another rounded the deeper, I scanned the window for watchers,

528
00:26:01,279 --> 00:26:03,839
nerved myself up with cheap coffee, and sent LEO coded

529
00:26:03,880 --> 00:26:07,119
message meeting with Loss and Fountain night. If I don't

530
00:26:07,200 --> 00:26:09,440
check in lock up. I spent the rest of the

531
00:26:09,480 --> 00:26:12,720
day plodding the Elbridge lot wouldn't have another bus leaving

532
00:26:12,799 --> 00:26:15,839
until midnight. I needed to get inside after iyres were

533
00:26:15,880 --> 00:26:18,279
at least up to the park buses, before roster changes

534
00:26:18,279 --> 00:26:21,160
were set everything. I also needed a back up location

535
00:26:21,279 --> 00:26:23,839
if things went wrong, where I could stash physical evidence

536
00:26:23,839 --> 00:26:27,640
for Leo. The eyres ticked by bags under my eyes

537
00:26:27,680 --> 00:26:30,880
grew heavier around dusk. I dialed the number left by

538
00:26:30,880 --> 00:26:33,000
the last missing persons posted, just to see if there

539
00:26:33,079 --> 00:26:36,519
be an answer. A man's voice answered, hollow and suspicious.

540
00:26:37,160 --> 00:26:40,519
I almost hung up, but forced myself to speak, Hi,

541
00:26:40,640 --> 00:26:43,359
I'm a reporter. I'm following up When the Aulbridge disappearances.

542
00:26:43,400 --> 00:26:46,000
He left your number on a missing poster. Fur I

543
00:26:46,039 --> 00:26:49,799
fumbled the notes with Alison Fern, the brittle pause. I

544
00:26:49,880 --> 00:26:51,759
told everyone what I could. Police said not to get

545
00:26:51,759 --> 00:26:54,559
involved any more. The voice said flat. Did she ever

546
00:26:54,599 --> 00:26:56,839
say anything about the bus, the late shift, or the

547
00:26:56,839 --> 00:27:00,000
back seats breathing on the other end. Then a muttered confession.

548
00:27:00,839 --> 00:27:03,279
She said, the bus seem barn Wayit smiled where you'd

549
00:27:03,279 --> 00:27:05,200
see the same person two nights, running but sitting in

550
00:27:05,200 --> 00:27:07,799
opposite places. She called me scared before she went missing.

551
00:27:07,839 --> 00:27:09,680
She said she thought some one was following Auer, but

552
00:27:09,759 --> 00:27:12,319
was sure not a person. The voice broke a little

553
00:27:12,319 --> 00:27:15,440
at the end. I heard a chair creak, muffled sobbing,

554
00:27:15,519 --> 00:27:18,640
then the lan click dead. My gilt, already jagged, was

555
00:27:18,640 --> 00:27:21,720
a little sharper. Evening fell dense and bleuw, the office

556
00:27:21,720 --> 00:27:24,519
windows of Elbridge deeper, blinking out one by one. When

557
00:27:24,559 --> 00:27:27,839
I finally headed back, the neighborhood was nearly deserted. I

558
00:27:27,880 --> 00:27:30,519
cut across the side alley, skirted the staff entry, trailed

559
00:27:30,519 --> 00:27:33,319
by my own overshadow. I kept to the pools of darkness,

560
00:27:33,400 --> 00:27:36,279
hot battering my ribs, the camcorder hidden beneath my arm

561
00:27:36,440 --> 00:27:39,359
at a chain between two barriers, approached waiting for guards

562
00:27:39,400 --> 00:27:42,440
to finish their round. No movement from inside the office,

563
00:27:42,680 --> 00:27:45,240
just the quite buzz of machinery. The lots melt of

564
00:27:45,319 --> 00:27:48,359
rubber and metallic rain. All night busses sat in a row,

565
00:27:48,559 --> 00:27:51,519
some with windows still beat it with condensation. I docked

566
00:27:51,559 --> 00:27:54,200
behind a row of trash bins, scanned the yard. The

567
00:27:54,240 --> 00:27:56,759
same circles clung to the glass of bus after bus,

568
00:27:56,799 --> 00:27:59,880
some new, others only faintly visible under the sodium vapor lamps.

569
00:28:00,559 --> 00:28:02,640
I waited a count of my breast tying the God's rout,

570
00:28:02,680 --> 00:28:04,640
until I slipped toward the dark. A span of bus

571
00:28:04,640 --> 00:28:08,400
windows farther in the angles turned rom The lot was

572
00:28:08,440 --> 00:28:10,119
too quiet, as if what happened here in the day

573
00:28:10,160 --> 00:28:13,519
belonged to another whirl, separated by some invisible membrane. I

574
00:28:13,519 --> 00:28:15,799
brushed my hand across the graffiti, feeling the etching with

575
00:28:15,839 --> 00:28:18,799
the tip of a finger. Ralph notched it hastily, but

576
00:28:18,880 --> 00:28:21,799
left as a sign for the next Something about touching

577
00:28:21,799 --> 00:28:25,240
a mark made my malcho dry. I froze, forcing myself

578
00:28:25,240 --> 00:28:27,440
to record a hush note on my phone. In the

579
00:28:27,440 --> 00:28:30,880
elveradge lot, all roar windows mark no new repairs, only circles,

580
00:28:31,000 --> 00:28:33,759
one spot per bus, always seat nineteen. No sign of

581
00:28:33,759 --> 00:28:36,039
cleaning efforts. Whoever marks the ease, it's for some one

582
00:28:36,039 --> 00:28:38,799
who's looking, not hiding. I'm standing here thinking my brother

583
00:28:38,839 --> 00:28:41,079
must have touched the same etching before he vanished. I

584
00:28:41,119 --> 00:28:43,400
want to believe there's an answer away home, A coat

585
00:28:43,480 --> 00:28:45,880
that isn't just another warning for another name to go missing.

586
00:28:46,480 --> 00:28:49,359
My whisper caught bitter and scared. A shape moved at

587
00:28:49,400 --> 00:28:51,279
the far edge of the lot, a security guard or

588
00:28:51,279 --> 00:28:54,400
some one else, their steps slow and methodical. I pressed

589
00:28:54,440 --> 00:28:56,720
myself flush against the metal, holding my breath until the

590
00:28:56,759 --> 00:28:59,759
silhouette turned away, a flush light being flicking along another bus.

591
00:29:00,480 --> 00:29:03,160
I slipped sideways back into the dark, my pulse lad

592
00:29:03,160 --> 00:29:05,960
in my ears. Step by step, I traced the perimeter,

593
00:29:06,119 --> 00:29:08,759
snapping phone photos where I could, sliding a handle on

594
00:29:08,839 --> 00:29:11,039
the coal metal until the camcorder clicked, the old tape

595
00:29:11,039 --> 00:29:13,039
wharriing as appointed it through the bus doors, assuming on

596
00:29:13,079 --> 00:29:16,720
the interior. In the grainyvy finder, Seat nineteen loomed empty,

597
00:29:16,839 --> 00:29:19,640
the circle vivid against the gloom. For a moment, it

598
00:29:19,680 --> 00:29:21,599
looked as if a shape hunched just beyond the aisle,

599
00:29:21,640 --> 00:29:25,039
half in light, half reflected. I blinked, blinked again, but

600
00:29:25,039 --> 00:29:28,559
found nothing except the corrosion on the armress. Movement again

601
00:29:28,720 --> 00:29:31,519
farther down the lot, my nose caught fire. I docked

602
00:29:31,519 --> 00:29:33,720
out the same way had come, bolting through chill air,

603
00:29:33,839 --> 00:29:36,440
praying I was moving too softly to register to any watcher.

604
00:29:37,000 --> 00:29:39,079
I didn't stop running until I reached the side street,

605
00:29:39,200 --> 00:29:41,680
long singing, with cold taste of metal bright in my mouth.

606
00:29:42,319 --> 00:29:44,680
I ducked into the first alley with cover back, pressed

607
00:29:44,680 --> 00:29:47,799
a brick and checked my phone. One new notification blinked

608
00:29:47,799 --> 00:29:52,559
at me to night, last bus act seat, no circles

609
00:29:53,279 --> 00:29:56,759
sent from an unlasted number. No reply possible. My skin

610
00:29:56,799 --> 00:29:59,839
crawled with fear and anticipation both. Was it a trap

611
00:30:00,440 --> 00:30:04,640
a genuine message signal from the journal's author. Iris remained

612
00:30:04,680 --> 00:30:07,920
until midnight. I sat on the stoop, reviewing my footage,

613
00:30:08,039 --> 00:30:10,319
pacing my plan into muscle memory, ready to board one

614
00:30:10,359 --> 00:30:13,240
last time if that's what it took for answers. Intermitten

615
00:30:13,279 --> 00:30:15,599
traffic glided down the half flit street, each set of

616
00:30:15,640 --> 00:30:19,039
headlight painting the opposite wall with rectangles of nervous brightness.

617
00:30:19,400 --> 00:30:22,559
Somewhere behind me, another bus rumbled through the neighbor cross street,

618
00:30:22,680 --> 00:30:24,799
already gone. By the time I looked over my shoulder,

619
00:30:25,359 --> 00:30:28,319
the world, minus the secret was moving on as usual.

620
00:30:28,920 --> 00:30:32,119
People got home and went to sleep. I watch waited,

621
00:30:32,200 --> 00:30:35,359
hungry for what only happened here after midnight. Tomorrow might

622
00:30:35,359 --> 00:30:37,640
bring answers or another name on a poster, a fresh

623
00:30:37,640 --> 00:30:40,519
circle scratched into glass. There was only the weight and

624
00:30:40,559 --> 00:30:42,759
the darkness, and the line between the two felt as

625
00:30:42,759 --> 00:30:45,319
thin as the night itself. The day after I was

626
00:30:45,359 --> 00:30:48,440
drapped into the parking lot, I short circuited every habitual movement.

627
00:30:48,960 --> 00:30:51,119
I could barely touch the record of even leaves bat

628
00:30:51,119 --> 00:30:53,640
at Concorda glared at me from atop a pile of laundry.

629
00:30:54,200 --> 00:30:56,599
But for at still eat with the memory of security's grip.

630
00:30:57,279 --> 00:31:00,599
Never mind fear. It was humiliation that grated most. My

631
00:31:00,680 --> 00:31:02,759
bags studded down beside the door, and I braced the

632
00:31:02,799 --> 00:31:05,279
knob with my palm, breath locked deep until Leo texted

633
00:31:05,319 --> 00:31:09,200
twice or quiet here, then anything new. I stared too

634
00:31:09,279 --> 00:31:11,799
long at the screen before replying no, trying to regroup.

635
00:31:12,319 --> 00:31:14,200
My voice felt like it belonged to some one else.

636
00:31:14,960 --> 00:31:17,240
It wasn't that I'd lost evidence. The most vital files

637
00:31:17,240 --> 00:31:20,559
had been uploaded. What I'd lost really was the thread.

638
00:31:21,119 --> 00:31:23,200
How many times could you circle the same names, the

639
00:31:23,240 --> 00:31:25,759
same sleepless wood at the county's edge Before even the

640
00:31:25,799 --> 00:31:29,079
determination got nunned. My apartment was a bunker behind a

641
00:31:29,119 --> 00:31:32,759
dozen locks. It didn't make me feel safer. I drank

642
00:31:32,799 --> 00:31:35,160
instant coffee and stared at the map above the kitchen table,

643
00:31:35,160 --> 00:31:37,119
the tangle of colored string and post it notes that

644
00:31:37,200 --> 00:31:40,039
didn't add up to anything, not even to closure. The

645
00:31:40,079 --> 00:31:43,039
alverage night line closed for maintenance was a lie that burned.

646
00:31:43,599 --> 00:31:45,799
I couldn't stop picturing the buses at stall, lights wet

647
00:31:45,839 --> 00:31:47,880
alled away in the sodium vapor last night, an animal

648
00:31:47,960 --> 00:31:50,759
vanishing into timber trailing circles etched in glass as a dare.

649
00:31:51,319 --> 00:31:54,440
But the game moved on with though without me. Before noon,

650
00:31:54,720 --> 00:31:57,359
my inbooks began sputtering again, First the usual spam, then

651
00:31:57,400 --> 00:31:59,880
a series of messages appearing from addresses only a hand

652
00:32:00,000 --> 00:32:04,200
full of people knew the families, parents, siblings, their girlfriend

653
00:32:04,240 --> 00:32:06,200
who shake a voice memory I cupied to my hard

654
00:32:06,240 --> 00:32:09,960
drive months before. Some were only checking in asking for upbates,

655
00:32:10,000 --> 00:32:13,200
others suspected in careful phrasings that something was happening out

656
00:32:13,200 --> 00:32:15,839
in the open. At last, one from a cousin of

657
00:32:15,839 --> 00:32:18,400
a vanished commuter, asked if I'd seen the police tape

658
00:32:18,400 --> 00:32:21,400
around the north lot that morning. Cops everywhere said it's

659
00:32:21,400 --> 00:32:24,400
a break in, but there were helicopters. I remembered two

660
00:32:24,440 --> 00:32:27,200
security men, the blank faces, the way they had locked

661
00:32:27,200 --> 00:32:30,319
eyes with the despatcher as he scurried behind glass. Harbin

662
00:32:30,440 --> 00:32:34,000
wasn't a uniform, he was a node, a participant. That clarity,

663
00:32:34,000 --> 00:32:37,759
stated me, sharpened the concrete realization of the stakes. Everyone

664
00:32:37,799 --> 00:32:39,759
on the inside of the system was performing a part.

665
00:32:40,319 --> 00:32:42,960
Even last night's thugs didn't act on their own. The

666
00:32:43,039 --> 00:32:45,920
real proof wouldn't wait behind a counter. It would be

667
00:32:45,960 --> 00:32:48,039
out there in the roster's Leo at half act, in

668
00:32:48,079 --> 00:32:50,240
the scold initials and code names, and the deeper love

669
00:32:50,279 --> 00:32:52,559
books on the footage that maybe maybe someone else had

670
00:32:52,559 --> 00:32:55,279
stashed before me. I refrained from cataloging what could happen

671
00:32:55,319 --> 00:32:58,119
if I gave up. The missing were in abstractions, not

672
00:32:58,240 --> 00:33:01,200
any longer. My brother's all geared photo on the edge

673
00:33:01,200 --> 00:33:03,799
of the desk kept it reel. I called Leo at noon,

674
00:33:04,319 --> 00:33:06,119
I want to meet just for an hour. I need

675
00:33:06,119 --> 00:33:08,640
help with a new angle. He answered too quickly. He

676
00:33:08,680 --> 00:33:11,599
was probably waiting for my call. Were not my place?

677
00:33:11,680 --> 00:33:14,599
Not now, We'll meet at the park two o'clock by

678
00:33:14,640 --> 00:33:17,839
the tennis Corps. I hadn't played tennis in years, but

679
00:33:17,880 --> 00:33:20,200
the reference was familiar, and the spot was public enough

680
00:33:20,200 --> 00:33:23,240
to banish the sense of lurking watchers. I brought only

681
00:33:23,279 --> 00:33:26,000
what was necessary, my phone, the battered notebook I managed

682
00:33:26,000 --> 00:33:28,119
to copy before it was snatched, and a single thumb

683
00:33:28,200 --> 00:33:30,880
drive loaded with a fuzzy security footage plus the shakest

684
00:33:30,920 --> 00:33:33,839
lead scrolled over a day of obsessive note taking. Leo

685
00:33:33,880 --> 00:33:35,960
waited on the bench, and a cap pulled low sun

686
00:33:36,000 --> 00:33:39,160
Buss's hiding most expression. He slid an envelope my way,

687
00:33:39,200 --> 00:33:41,960
eyes fixed on a couple slow dragging by. It got

688
00:33:42,000 --> 00:33:44,119
something from an old friend at the phone company. Only

689
00:33:44,119 --> 00:33:46,559
pings on the Albert were at random busts, like phantom phones,

690
00:33:46,559 --> 00:33:49,240
activating for a few seconds then nothing. Can't trace them,

691
00:33:49,279 --> 00:33:51,960
but a pattern matches the missing persons manifests always the

692
00:33:52,039 --> 00:33:54,680
last run. I smoothed my thumb over the warm packet,

693
00:33:54,680 --> 00:33:57,559
old phone logs, bus roster print outs, and something new,

694
00:33:57,640 --> 00:34:00,000
a yellowed water smash page torn from what looked like

695
00:34:00,039 --> 00:34:04,079
a depot notebook, three names next to each a time,

696
00:34:04,119 --> 00:34:07,680
a codolpha, bravo, delta, then a tight spiral circles at

697
00:34:07,680 --> 00:34:09,880
the bottom, two block initials i'll h match in the

698
00:34:09,920 --> 00:34:13,480
journal's author, and a final note rushed in spiky. Always

699
00:34:13,519 --> 00:34:16,199
ride the last run. Don't let them count you, Leo

700
00:34:16,239 --> 00:34:19,519
shifted closer. I heard something out at the depot. My

701
00:34:19,559 --> 00:34:22,119
own contact says three drivers rotated off the late shift

702
00:34:22,119 --> 00:34:25,400
over night, supposedly for stress, but no replacement listed. None

703
00:34:25,400 --> 00:34:28,320
of them went home. Think it's a coincidence. I shook

704
00:34:28,360 --> 00:34:31,840
my head. They're moving people out, changing the script. The

705
00:34:31,960 --> 00:34:35,000
urgency knife through my exhaustion. I need to get back in,

706
00:34:35,199 --> 00:34:37,320
find the survivor. Maybe she left a map the oor

707
00:34:37,360 --> 00:34:40,119
symbols in the notebook. See I pointed to a crude

708
00:34:40,119 --> 00:34:42,920
rendering a highway lines gide so the right angle formed

709
00:34:42,920 --> 00:34:46,559
a triangle overlaid with three circles. You understand what that means?

710
00:34:47,280 --> 00:34:50,639
He shrugged, secret stops head in exchanges. I don't know,

711
00:34:50,719 --> 00:34:52,639
but if you go back, you can't go alone. They

712
00:34:52,679 --> 00:34:55,039
watch the law, the despatch are still there. Probably the

713
00:34:55,079 --> 00:34:58,840
cops won't help. But I raised a hand stopping him.

714
00:34:59,320 --> 00:35:01,840
I have to think about what's at stake. If I disappear,

715
00:35:02,199 --> 00:35:04,840
I'll plut everything straight to the Congressional, amongst the families,

716
00:35:04,880 --> 00:35:09,000
the press, all of it. Leo's voice dropped. Yeah, sure,

717
00:35:09,079 --> 00:35:13,320
but be careful. He scanned the park, nervous, there's something else.

718
00:35:13,360 --> 00:35:15,360
I checked phone logs to see where your brother's phone

719
00:35:15,400 --> 00:35:17,559
last pin day after it dropped off at Albert, someone

720
00:35:17,599 --> 00:35:19,599
turned it on just for a minute. The next night

721
00:35:19,639 --> 00:35:22,400
had stopped north of here. Then never again. My mouth

722
00:35:22,480 --> 00:35:26,400
dried out. I'd force myself to believe it was lost, stolen, discarded,

723
00:35:26,480 --> 00:35:29,960
dead in some shallow ditch. Now visions crowded in a

724
00:35:30,039 --> 00:35:32,159
phone we enemated just long enough to signal a hand

725
00:35:32,199 --> 00:35:35,079
off at trotsfer, part of some calculated exchange, and traceable

726
00:35:35,079 --> 00:35:37,880
by any normal means. It was proof that what happened

727
00:35:37,880 --> 00:35:40,480
on these buses didn't always stop with a single disappearance.

728
00:35:41,079 --> 00:35:43,920
A hard knot settled under my ribs. I scobbled a

729
00:35:43,960 --> 00:35:46,280
signal for Leo to leave, then stuffed the envelope into

730
00:35:46,280 --> 00:35:48,920
my coat. Before he walked away. He reached over and

731
00:35:48,920 --> 00:35:51,039
squeezed my arm. The look and his eyes clear, you'll

732
00:35:51,039 --> 00:35:53,679
do this, No, matter what back in my apartment. Thus

733
00:35:53,760 --> 00:35:56,440
drew the city encloser, tight light, no sliding under the skin.

734
00:35:57,039 --> 00:35:58,840
The walls pressed with the sense of time moving in

735
00:35:58,880 --> 00:36:01,639
two directions, the past threatening to call back in the future,

736
00:36:01,679 --> 00:36:04,719
prickling with dread. I texted two of the relatives careful

737
00:36:04,840 --> 00:36:07,559
only with generic reassurances, while encrypting the latest day to

738
00:36:07,639 --> 00:36:10,719
dump for backup. I didn't trust the cloud, or the police,

739
00:36:11,039 --> 00:36:13,599
or even the press. At this point, the system out

740
00:36:13,599 --> 00:36:16,960
there was still very much intact and alive. Dark came quickly,

741
00:36:17,000 --> 00:36:18,960
and with it the static of anxiety, key to every

742
00:36:19,000 --> 00:36:22,119
low sound from the street. I checked the peephole three times,

743
00:36:22,159 --> 00:36:25,320
double bolted the door. The city outside buzzed and wailed,

744
00:36:25,360 --> 00:36:27,880
But here it was the slow tick of intention, not memory,

745
00:36:27,920 --> 00:36:30,400
that made me pack my bag in you the Alberge

746
00:36:30,440 --> 00:36:32,840
night Run would leave with or without me. If what

747
00:36:32,920 --> 00:36:35,280
the survivors and code had map suggested was honest. To

748
00:36:35,400 --> 00:36:38,239
night and to night only would be the window. Ten

749
00:36:38,280 --> 00:36:40,719
minutes before midnight, I laced up my boots, secured the

750
00:36:40,719 --> 00:36:43,519
camcorder under an old parker, and texted Leo gone to

751
00:36:43,559 --> 00:36:45,199
catch the last line. If you don't get a final

752
00:36:45,280 --> 00:36:49,239
pang by foy and mail everything. His reply was immediately sculomoji,

753
00:36:49,280 --> 00:36:52,400
then a shield. I made my way out Hodlow, blending

754
00:36:52,400 --> 00:36:55,079
into the garbage de crowds and late nights dragglers. The

755
00:36:55,119 --> 00:36:57,840
street smelled of burnt oil when twisted wrappers scittering in

756
00:36:57,880 --> 00:37:01,119
the gutter, I cut through alleys. Insight streets were tracing

757
00:37:01,159 --> 00:37:03,159
the path to the elverage deepot with something more like

758
00:37:03,159 --> 00:37:06,800
resignation than adrenaline. A single stray cat trapped me two blocks,

759
00:37:06,840 --> 00:37:10,039
then vanished behind a dumpster. The lot was deserted except

760
00:37:10,079 --> 00:37:12,280
for one batter taxi idling at the curb as driver

761
00:37:12,360 --> 00:37:15,039
half asleep, hat pulled down. I checked the map on

762
00:37:15,079 --> 00:37:18,159
I formed no service. Predictably, the night besidled beneath the

763
00:37:18,159 --> 00:37:21,400
sodium vapor windows, reflecting nothing but black excerpt again for

764
00:37:21,480 --> 00:37:23,840
the faint echo of circles scratched into the rear glass.

765
00:37:24,599 --> 00:37:27,000
I stooped, ducked behind a trash can, waited for a

766
00:37:27,000 --> 00:37:30,760
perimeter check. No movement. The rear gate to the lot

767
00:37:30,800 --> 00:37:33,760
was closed. The fence slumped beneath its own rst. I

768
00:37:33,800 --> 00:37:37,039
circled white, slipped through kinkin amesh. This was the point

769
00:37:37,079 --> 00:37:39,000
of no return. The lust shot to see, to capture,

770
00:37:39,119 --> 00:37:41,920
to prove. I approached the bus from the blind side,

771
00:37:42,039 --> 00:37:45,679
heart thudding, adrenaline now circulating, sharp and cold. The metal

772
00:37:45,679 --> 00:37:48,400
shell was bone cold to the touch. I slid open

773
00:37:48,400 --> 00:37:50,840
the door and locked on and stepped inside. The erran

774
00:37:50,920 --> 00:37:53,920
sight was still threatening. My sneakers quaked on the rubber

775
00:37:53,960 --> 00:37:56,800
tread under the blue puddle light. Half the seats glimmered

776
00:37:56,800 --> 00:38:00,760
with moisture. The circles on Seat nineteen glared back. I

777
00:38:00,880 --> 00:38:03,079
ran my fingers along the scarred vinyl, pulled open the

778
00:38:03,079 --> 00:38:06,199
metal slit below a slip of line. Paper fluttered loost,

779
00:38:06,239 --> 00:38:08,800
just a single word penned in a tight, juttery hand

780
00:38:08,880 --> 00:38:12,599
to night. My pole's hiccupped. A crackle came from overhead

781
00:38:12,599 --> 00:38:15,800
of voice warped by the greenness of old speakers. Final

782
00:38:15,840 --> 00:38:19,079
boarding for elbertch to step quickly. I ducked instinctively, then

783
00:38:19,079 --> 00:38:20,960
climbed higher into the bus, choosing a seat in the

784
00:38:20,960 --> 00:38:24,480
first half. Camcorder in my lap. The bus doors shudder hut,

785
00:38:24,639 --> 00:38:26,639
and the wall narrower to the length of a lonely aisle,

786
00:38:26,679 --> 00:38:29,400
and the faces scattered in shatters. The bus rolled out

787
00:38:29,400 --> 00:38:31,840
of the bay, driver half lit like a priest the night,

788
00:38:31,840 --> 00:38:34,280
giving nothing away in return. We rumbled out of a

789
00:38:34,320 --> 00:38:37,119
deeper siallet lot emerged with the arterial sweep of Highway

790
00:38:37,159 --> 00:38:39,840
forty four. The bus's motion steady as a trans drum.

791
00:38:40,079 --> 00:38:42,480
I sat hunched near the front, hungrily scanning for any

792
00:38:42,519 --> 00:38:44,920
one I might recognize. A tired man in a blue windbreaker,

793
00:38:44,960 --> 00:38:47,519
a pair of students muttering over Earbard's, an elderly woman

794
00:38:47,599 --> 00:38:50,760
knitting with slow and certain movements, nothing unusual if he

795
00:38:50,840 --> 00:38:52,920
discounted the way. None of the riders met my eyes.

796
00:38:53,639 --> 00:38:55,519
I depressed a record in the cam quorder by feel.

797
00:38:56,039 --> 00:38:58,960
Pixelated green lines scrolled over the lens battery, a half tape,

798
00:38:59,000 --> 00:39:01,719
churning with every bump. I held my phone loosely as

799
00:39:01,719 --> 00:39:04,440
a texting, careful to angle its cracked camera toward the

800
00:39:04,519 --> 00:39:07,880
rows behind me. Through the glass, Elbert loomed in the distance,

801
00:39:08,199 --> 00:39:10,440
no broader or more meaningful than a place he passed

802
00:39:10,440 --> 00:39:13,559
through out of necessity. Every few blocks we stopped at

803
00:39:13,559 --> 00:39:16,119
ghosy shelters or in front of convenient stores. With Neon

804
00:39:16,159 --> 00:39:19,599
Hart pulsing. Two more passengers boarded, Both men in on

805
00:39:19,679 --> 00:39:23,360
the script jackets, movements too synchronized to be accidental. They

806
00:39:23,480 --> 00:39:25,679
had a part life and right, and I noted them

807
00:39:25,719 --> 00:39:27,800
in the fresh page of my note book. New faces

808
00:39:27,880 --> 00:39:31,639
look at hands, knot screens, alert scanning the bust end.

809
00:39:32,360 --> 00:39:35,280
The driver's voice us from overhead again, we'll be making

810
00:39:35,280 --> 00:39:37,760
limited stops to night. Please stay in your sign seats.

811
00:39:38,559 --> 00:39:41,360
Something in the tone confided itself to those listening for codes.

812
00:39:42,000 --> 00:39:44,159
At the midway mark, we entered a blacked out stretch

813
00:39:44,159 --> 00:39:46,079
border by forests that huddled up to the road of

814
00:39:46,079 --> 00:39:48,719
no ambient light from houses or signs, only the rimmic

815
00:39:48,760 --> 00:39:51,119
cut of the head lights. I could make out shapes

816
00:39:51,159 --> 00:39:54,480
beyond the glass, sometimes just branches, sometimes more edgeless forms

817
00:39:54,480 --> 00:39:57,440
that melted into the periphery. My own time since walped

818
00:39:57,440 --> 00:40:00,400
each mile longer than the last, every curve identical. I

819
00:40:00,440 --> 00:40:03,320
saw glances at my phone. The clock flicker displayed midnight,

820
00:40:03,440 --> 00:40:06,119
then too too, then was blank. The movement of the

821
00:40:06,159 --> 00:40:09,000
bus slow, the engines noised alled. The woman with the

822
00:40:09,039 --> 00:40:12,639
knitting dropped a stitch, Her hands trembled, The air felt charged,

823
00:40:12,719 --> 00:40:15,920
prickling at my scalp. A few rose behind. One of

824
00:40:15,960 --> 00:40:18,199
the new men stowed, fixing his gaze on the rear.

825
00:40:18,800 --> 00:40:20,760
He seemed to size up, both the passengers and the

826
00:40:20,880 --> 00:40:24,320
edged circles and the glass. I held my breath, waited

827
00:40:24,400 --> 00:40:26,280
for what I'd rehearsed in my mind a dozen times,

828
00:40:26,280 --> 00:40:30,400
confrontation or revelation, or some simple explanation. Instead, the man

829
00:40:30,440 --> 00:40:33,360
returned his seat, folding his hands, waiting. Then the bus

830
00:40:33,400 --> 00:40:35,760
jerked once hard, as if something had stepped on to

831
00:40:35,840 --> 00:40:38,199
the road, and the vehicle, too obedient, stopped just shy

832
00:40:38,239 --> 00:40:43,320
of collision. Passengers startled, seat creaked. No one spoke. The

833
00:40:43,360 --> 00:40:46,280
engine idled for an eternity, then shut off in the

834
00:40:46,280 --> 00:40:48,480
perfect hush before any one could break it. A tall

835
00:40:48,519 --> 00:40:51,039
figure in a conductor's uniform entered from the front force,

836
00:40:51,079 --> 00:40:53,119
carrying with it an authority shape by habit more than

837
00:40:53,119 --> 00:40:58,320
by threat. Tickets out verification required. Each passenger, myself included,

838
00:40:58,400 --> 00:41:01,519
produced a battered slip or fluster of He checked tickets

839
00:41:01,519 --> 00:41:04,840
with mechanical precision, glancing at the serial numbers, rubber stabbing

840
00:41:04,920 --> 00:41:08,000
only select ones. When he reached me, his gaze lingered

841
00:41:08,039 --> 00:41:11,800
longer than necessary purpose of travel. He murmured, ice narrowing

842
00:41:12,360 --> 00:41:14,760
the journalist, I said, a voice lower than a whisper

843
00:41:15,320 --> 00:41:19,159
on assignment, a pause just long enough to signal understanding,

844
00:41:19,679 --> 00:41:22,599
he stamped my ticket. Any waitanks watched or ring overlap

845
00:41:22,639 --> 00:41:25,159
in the arch of the elbridge logo. He continued down

846
00:41:25,239 --> 00:41:28,559
the aisle. The last passenger, a teenager in a hoodie,

847
00:41:28,760 --> 00:41:32,000
produced a ticket that looked too new. The conductor scrutinized it,

848
00:41:32,039 --> 00:41:35,159
then knotted him through. For a moment, all seemed routine.

849
00:41:35,559 --> 00:41:39,079
Then the driver's voice, soft but caring, intoned, prepare for transfer.

850
00:41:39,679 --> 00:41:42,840
Those words alien in a bus context landed with unmistakable dread.

851
00:41:43,440 --> 00:41:45,800
At the edge of my hearing, A hissing began, maybe static,

852
00:41:45,880 --> 00:41:48,360
maybe whispered codes run through a pet truck of radios.

853
00:41:49,000 --> 00:41:51,320
The two men in jackets slurched up in tandem, hustled

854
00:41:51,320 --> 00:41:54,440
toward the back the bus lights. What remained of them sputtered,

855
00:41:54,480 --> 00:41:57,840
then steaded at half The rear door raffled in the

856
00:41:57,880 --> 00:42:01,280
isle's convex mirror. I watched as another g faces shadowed

857
00:42:01,440 --> 00:42:04,559
filed on board, exchanging noobs with the conductor. They took

858
00:42:04,599 --> 00:42:06,880
inventory of the seat in glancing at the mark circle.

859
00:42:07,440 --> 00:42:10,199
One gesture, finger drawn across the mark like a priest benediction,

860
00:42:10,280 --> 00:42:13,000
before signaling toward the hoarded teenager, who shrank back in

861
00:42:13,079 --> 00:42:16,480
his seat. The woman knitting sat frozen her ball of wol,

862
00:42:16,519 --> 00:42:18,920
rolling to the edge of the aisle. I call her,

863
00:42:18,960 --> 00:42:21,320
looking at me, a plea heavy in her eyes. I

864
00:42:21,400 --> 00:42:25,239
pressed record anwscrambled for words on elbridge, ran on expect

865
00:42:25,239 --> 00:42:28,360
to transfer, possible force removal. I slipped the phone into

866
00:42:28,360 --> 00:42:31,000
an inside pocket, lens peeking between the folds of my coat,

867
00:42:31,039 --> 00:42:34,440
helping the angle would catch faces, badges, whatever would service proof.

868
00:42:35,000 --> 00:42:38,000
Suddenly an arm clamped round my shoulder. One of the

869
00:42:38,039 --> 00:42:40,760
jacketed men glared down at me, brat sire for his pitch,

870
00:42:40,840 --> 00:42:43,119
so only I would hear. You should exit here now.

871
00:42:43,679 --> 00:42:46,480
He propelled me half standing, hand biting into my triceps.

872
00:42:47,159 --> 00:42:49,119
My instinct was to fight, before I remembered the back

873
00:42:49,199 --> 00:42:52,719
up plan. I pressed the concorder into his wrist, accidentally

874
00:42:52,760 --> 00:42:56,320
turning it toward the aisle. He forced me back, murmuring

875
00:42:56,559 --> 00:43:00,840
reporter Wright, always watching, always talking. He flicked something into

876
00:43:00,880 --> 00:43:03,559
my lap A transfer slip folded into a triangle. I

877
00:43:03,599 --> 00:43:07,000
opened at hands, trembling on the paper, harping platform b

878
00:43:07,199 --> 00:43:10,440
one a m. They expect you. Suddenly the passenger with

879
00:43:10,480 --> 00:43:12,599
the hood was dragged upright to shoved toward the back door.

880
00:43:13,159 --> 00:43:15,679
The rest of us stared dumb stroke, paralyzed by the

881
00:43:15,679 --> 00:43:18,920
sense of rulls breaking, wild's colliding. The conductor brandished a

882
00:43:18,960 --> 00:43:21,239
page and the teen was led away, vanishing into trees,

883
00:43:21,239 --> 00:43:23,960
bristling with night. A moment later at the bus dirked

884
00:43:23,960 --> 00:43:26,599
back to life, engine coughing, lights flaring to full brightness.

885
00:43:27,159 --> 00:43:29,679
The driver's voice was cheerier than ever, rehearsed and hollow

886
00:43:29,679 --> 00:43:32,719
as an airline safety videer. Thank you for your compliant

887
00:43:32,760 --> 00:43:36,599
final stop Alberdge. In seven minutes, no one spoke, shokashed

888
00:43:36,679 --> 00:43:39,800
language that deadened every muscle. The knitting woman fumbled her

889
00:43:39,880 --> 00:43:43,000
yawn into her back, staring holes in the floor. I

890
00:43:43,079 --> 00:43:45,760
kept the slip in my palm, nerves white hot. The

891
00:43:45,800 --> 00:43:48,599
bus coasted back onto the imperfect rubon of highway, drawing

892
00:43:48,639 --> 00:43:52,159
us to that final, always ambiguous destination. The depot emerged,

893
00:43:52,320 --> 00:43:55,840
half shrouded by trees. I watched the entrance, noting the

894
00:43:55,840 --> 00:43:58,599
forms of two security gods pacing the current faces averted,

895
00:43:58,679 --> 00:44:01,280
doing their best to avoid looking at the windows. The

896
00:44:01,280 --> 00:44:03,519
bus hissed breaks, sighing as we rolled to a stop.

897
00:44:04,119 --> 00:44:06,880
I clutched my back. Other passengers clustered to the exit,

898
00:44:06,960 --> 00:44:09,840
careful to avoid any show of panic. We shuffled on

899
00:44:09,840 --> 00:44:12,719
to the platform in silence. The woman who'd been knitting

900
00:44:12,719 --> 00:44:15,679
caught my sleeve. She whispered, a not so much in fear,

901
00:44:15,800 --> 00:44:17,599
but with the urgency of some one passing on the

902
00:44:17,679 --> 00:44:20,599
last match before the light runs out. Don't go. Any

903
00:44:20,599 --> 00:44:23,400
One who meets him alone doesn't come back. I nodded,

904
00:44:23,559 --> 00:44:26,239
feigning nonchalance, but my chest clamped tight, as if I'd

905
00:44:26,239 --> 00:44:28,679
swallowed a stone. A few feet away, one of the

906
00:44:28,760 --> 00:44:31,280
jacket demand thum. The despatch officers keep at shooting me

907
00:44:31,320 --> 00:44:34,360
a warning glance and spoken instruction to stay away. I

908
00:44:34,400 --> 00:44:37,440
ignored it, moving instead toward the far end of the platform,

909
00:44:37,480 --> 00:44:40,840
where the transfer slip implied a different entrance between broken

910
00:44:40,880 --> 00:44:43,239
down vending machines and the stench of spilt soda. I

911
00:44:43,320 --> 00:44:46,280
tisted a handle on the side door. It was unlocked.

912
00:44:46,960 --> 00:44:50,519
Inside the staff arears sprawlt deserted at the hire, empty chairs,

913
00:44:50,679 --> 00:44:54,360
monitor showing static, the distinct absence of anyone cleaning or overseeing.

914
00:44:54,960 --> 00:44:57,440
I ducked into a corridor lined with all photocollages of

915
00:44:57,480 --> 00:45:01,199
employee picnics and shattered clock faces. A fluorescent bulb flickered

916
00:45:01,199 --> 00:45:03,960
above a security door stamped with the platform b The

917
00:45:04,000 --> 00:45:06,199
corridor was empty, the world gone thick with the hum

918
00:45:06,199 --> 00:45:09,000
of machines. On the other side, a thin man in

919
00:45:09,039 --> 00:45:11,880
a light windbreaker hobbyin waited, framed by the glaring rectangle

920
00:45:11,920 --> 00:45:15,159
of CCTV monitor. He invited me in without open palm,

921
00:45:15,880 --> 00:45:18,480
exhaust in twisted his features. No sleep, Two many nights,

922
00:45:18,480 --> 00:45:21,239
moved by scripts, he only half controlled the last run

923
00:45:21,280 --> 00:45:25,519
for you? Isn't it harbinass force? Brittle? Exhausted, he motioned

924
00:45:25,519 --> 00:45:27,159
for me to sit at a folding table piled with

925
00:45:27,199 --> 00:45:29,519
buzz logs, a rotary phone, and a half empty bottle

926
00:45:29,559 --> 00:45:32,239
of collar. You want the story, or maybe the rest

927
00:45:32,239 --> 00:45:34,880
of it. I pressed a record on the phone, shielded

928
00:45:34,880 --> 00:45:37,360
it with my body. Where are they going the once

929
00:45:37,400 --> 00:45:39,920
from the back? Is it all trafficking? He gave a

930
00:45:39,960 --> 00:45:43,119
sad shrug, half contempt, half apology. There is more money

931
00:45:43,119 --> 00:45:46,159
moving people than moving freight these days. Some disappear suddenly,

932
00:45:46,199 --> 00:45:48,639
others slowly. Not all come up listed, but mostly it's

933
00:45:48,639 --> 00:45:52,679
about debt, threats, leverage. He spread his hands. I just

934
00:45:52,719 --> 00:45:55,800
moved the pieces, the ones marked. Sometimes therein, sometimes they

935
00:45:55,800 --> 00:45:59,400
are out. The rest. Nobody cares. My nerves shivered recognized

936
00:45:59,400 --> 00:46:01,800
in the script the effort to normalize evil through Benardi.

937
00:46:02,360 --> 00:46:06,480
I pressed harder the circles. They're tight for insider's safe passage.

938
00:46:06,960 --> 00:46:09,320
The mark means you're known off the ledge. Sometimes it

939
00:46:09,440 --> 00:46:13,079
means protection. Sometimes target depends on who's running at that ride.

940
00:46:13,119 --> 00:46:16,400
I don't paint them. He laced his fingers, glancing sidelong

941
00:46:16,400 --> 00:46:19,840
at the security feed. Sometimes I get messages same as

942
00:46:19,880 --> 00:46:22,800
you never sign my own name. Don't ask questions. My

943
00:46:22,880 --> 00:46:26,079
anger rose to the surface, and the ones who don't reappear.

944
00:46:26,599 --> 00:46:30,719
He avoided my gaze. You know the tensions seroted between

945
00:46:30,800 --> 00:46:35,280
us a press Where's my brother? Harbin actually winced. I

946
00:46:35,320 --> 00:46:37,800
don't know. Really, I could say out, I could say lost.

947
00:46:37,880 --> 00:46:40,800
But the gaps are deliberate. Records go missing, files get replaced,

948
00:46:40,840 --> 00:46:43,280
Footage gets scrubbed. Part of the deal. They move names around,

949
00:46:43,400 --> 00:46:45,639
shuffle debts, cut the line when it suits them. I

950
00:46:45,639 --> 00:46:49,280
only see the paperwork. He steepled his hands for suddenly sharp.

951
00:46:49,320 --> 00:46:51,840
If he publish, you'll get half the truth. The rest.

952
00:46:51,920 --> 00:46:54,159
These people don't go down easy shut one route they

953
00:46:54,159 --> 00:46:55,920
opened to remark. You saw the alerts. Do you know

954
00:46:55,920 --> 00:46:58,679
the circles aren't just on buses now. Just then a

955
00:46:58,760 --> 00:47:00,960
clackes and thudded through the core door, not an alarm,

956
00:47:01,039 --> 00:47:03,440
but the heavy industrial buzzer, signaling a change and shift.

957
00:47:04,119 --> 00:47:07,519
Harbin rose, smoothing the cuffs of his windbreaker. Time's up.

958
00:47:07,679 --> 00:47:09,440
If you want to make it out, go now. If

959
00:47:09,480 --> 00:47:11,719
you stay, he shrugged, finishing the sentence with the wariness

960
00:47:11,760 --> 00:47:14,480
of goodbye. A shoff all and a half strangled cough

961
00:47:14,519 --> 00:47:19,400
came from the hall. Someone too approached. Harbin moved toward

962
00:47:19,440 --> 00:47:21,920
the security glass, pumped open the emergency ate it latch

963
00:47:21,960 --> 00:47:24,840
beside his chair. He paused just long enough to look

964
00:47:24,920 --> 00:47:27,360
me in the eye. You want a face for your story,

965
00:47:27,400 --> 00:47:29,599
take mine, but it won't save you. Get the evidence

966
00:47:29,639 --> 00:47:32,440
down the line. Don't come back. I barely heard him,

967
00:47:32,480 --> 00:47:34,960
barely had time to gather my back, slipped the camcorder

968
00:47:35,000 --> 00:47:37,400
into my jacket before said of heavier boots closed. Then

969
00:47:37,920 --> 00:47:40,360
the door rattled on its hinges. Two security men again,

970
00:47:40,559 --> 00:47:44,039
face as blank as knuckles. Harbin drew himself up, blocking

971
00:47:44,119 --> 00:47:47,800
my retreat. He's leaving en of shift for a second.

972
00:47:47,960 --> 00:47:51,599
It looks like they'd argue instead. One reached behind his back,

973
00:47:51,719 --> 00:47:54,159
which drew a bundless stack of cassettes each labeled only

974
00:47:54,199 --> 00:47:57,440
with dates and bus numbers. Harbin pushed them into my hands,

975
00:47:57,559 --> 00:48:00,239
forced so low. I flinched to hear it. Take these

976
00:48:00,320 --> 00:48:02,920
proof if anything happens, send them. It's not everything, but

977
00:48:02,960 --> 00:48:06,239
it'll hurt them. One security man raised nyghbra, but let

978
00:48:06,239 --> 00:48:09,719
it go. I edge pass, pull's fluttering, every sense vibrating

979
00:48:10,280 --> 00:48:12,599
out in the corridor. I ran, not with relief for terror.

980
00:48:13,079 --> 00:48:14,840
I didn't stop until I hit the outside out of

981
00:48:14,880 --> 00:48:17,599
brettorn from my throat. It was two in the morning.

982
00:48:18,280 --> 00:48:21,760
My phone dead frivees flickered live. Two messages queued, the

983
00:48:21,800 --> 00:48:24,000
first a blurry image of a bus seat marked with

984
00:48:24,079 --> 00:48:27,679
three circles the caption to night. The second an audio file.

985
00:48:27,719 --> 00:48:31,800
Tinney stressed, I played it hard out amizing the survivor's voice.

986
00:48:31,840 --> 00:48:34,159
The journals Autho crackled live, her ax and sharper than

987
00:48:34,159 --> 00:48:36,280
in the message before go Now, if you're hearing this,

988
00:48:36,559 --> 00:48:38,920
I'm at the last stop beyond the woods. Doors open,

989
00:48:39,000 --> 00:48:40,920
but they never really close. They'll try to trade you

990
00:48:41,039 --> 00:48:42,960
like they did the others. Always ride near the front.

991
00:48:43,039 --> 00:48:45,320
Don't trust anyone who doesn't meteor eye. I'll leave this

992
00:48:45,360 --> 00:48:48,000
for you. Come if you want out for real, desperation

993
00:48:48,239 --> 00:48:50,480
or exhaustion pushed me. I checked the time, some cent

994
00:48:50,559 --> 00:48:53,639
just minutes before I scanned the edge of the depot,

995
00:48:53,760 --> 00:48:56,639
Beyond the fence. The woodland press, close branches graping the wind,

996
00:48:56,719 --> 00:48:59,840
crowned thick with needles. The moon was gone behind clouds,

997
00:49:00,039 --> 00:49:03,400
but a thin pocket flasklight still shone from the tree's mouth, tiny, deliberate,

998
00:49:03,480 --> 00:49:07,159
drawing me forward. No other choice lined up. I pressed

999
00:49:07,159 --> 00:49:09,679
through the side gate, slipping into the tree line, certain

1000
00:49:09,760 --> 00:49:11,679
now I'd been seen only because someone wanted me to

1001
00:49:11,719 --> 00:49:15,360
him move. My lungs bit were cold. Needles scraped my

1002
00:49:15,360 --> 00:49:17,599
face as I moved, stepping over the shattered cylinder of

1003
00:49:17,599 --> 00:49:20,880
a flashlight abandoned halfway in. Wind battered the high branches,

1004
00:49:21,440 --> 00:49:24,519
the darkness felt denser than ever, a live thing responding

1005
00:49:24,559 --> 00:49:26,679
to my footfalls closing in As I forced a path

1006
00:49:26,679 --> 00:49:30,400
toward the signal. Somewhere behind me, shouts tangled with the distance.

1007
00:49:30,559 --> 00:49:32,519
I risked a look over my shoulder and saw nothing

1008
00:49:32,559 --> 00:49:34,320
but the sway of branches and a glinting pair of

1009
00:49:34,400 --> 00:49:37,719
headlights from a receding bus. I staggered on, hoping the

1010
00:49:37,760 --> 00:49:40,639
survivor el was truly alive, not just another voice snared

1011
00:49:40,679 --> 00:49:44,360
in my phone. Every step taxed my focus. A clearing

1012
00:49:44,400 --> 00:49:47,159
opened scuffed herth ringed by pale mushrooms and trash too

1013
00:49:47,159 --> 00:49:49,440
clean to be old. At the edge of the circle,

1014
00:49:49,480 --> 00:49:52,159
the flashlight sat half submerged in mound, beaming like a taunt.

1015
00:49:52,760 --> 00:49:55,679
A person stepped from shadow, short angular jacket stained with

1016
00:49:55,760 --> 00:49:59,079
road dust. She regarded me with suspicion, then the horrid

1017
00:49:59,119 --> 00:50:02,480
pragmatism of a fellow fugitive. You followed the message brave

1018
00:50:02,559 --> 00:50:05,400
or stupid to eat away? You made it. Her voice,

1019
00:50:05,480 --> 00:50:07,960
when not throttled by static, was clear or burned out,

1020
00:50:08,039 --> 00:50:11,039
but fierce. She gestured me into the deeper woods with

1021
00:50:11,079 --> 00:50:14,079
a terse wave. We have five minutes no more. Harbon

1022
00:50:14,159 --> 00:50:16,239
is the weakest link, but not alone. They were watching

1023
00:50:16,239 --> 00:50:17,920
the main exits. Stick with me. You can get to

1024
00:50:18,000 --> 00:50:20,360
the service road. Make any noise, they'll no. Keep your

1025
00:50:20,360 --> 00:50:23,440
head down, stay off the path, I nodded, voice leaden

1026
00:50:23,480 --> 00:50:26,280
with adrenaline. You left your name on the logs al

1027
00:50:26,440 --> 00:50:31,440
h my brother. She shook me off. Too many sisters, brothers, friends.

1028
00:50:31,480 --> 00:50:34,360
They blurred together. In the end, she shone the flashlight

1029
00:50:34,400 --> 00:50:38,639
back the way we came. Why I've blurted finally damned up.

1030
00:50:38,719 --> 00:50:41,440
Questions breaking free. Why do they do it this way?

1031
00:50:41,800 --> 00:50:44,159
Is it just the money? She turned on me. Iye,

1032
00:50:44,159 --> 00:50:47,800
shining wet, but anger not grief, power control. There's more

1033
00:50:47,800 --> 00:50:50,639
effort tracking money than tracking loss lives. They've been exchanging

1034
00:50:50,639 --> 00:50:54,199
writers for years, through flattered routes, secret drop offs and circles.

1035
00:50:54,199 --> 00:50:56,519
Only a few ever understand when they trade someone that

1036
00:50:56,639 --> 00:50:59,000
Marx has leave this one or take this one, sometimes

1037
00:50:59,000 --> 00:51:01,280
for debts, sometimes for what they know or what they

1038
00:51:01,280 --> 00:51:04,599
are willing to become. What do we do now, I asked?

1039
00:51:05,400 --> 00:51:08,559
She considered, get to the city up, put everything you have,

1040
00:51:08,639 --> 00:51:12,079
audio tape locks, Forget the police. The organization's reach as

1041
00:51:12,079 --> 00:51:15,079
bone deep, go higher, bigger newspapers, the right advocates, blow

1042
00:51:15,159 --> 00:51:17,400
up the machinery. If you want your brother, assume he's

1043
00:51:17,440 --> 00:51:20,679
either inside or gone. I'm sorry. The words dung more

1044
00:51:20,719 --> 00:51:23,239
than I thought they could. I fumbled in my pocket,

1045
00:51:23,280 --> 00:51:26,559
handed to the bundle of cosetts. You take these, I'll

1046
00:51:27,239 --> 00:51:30,079
she cut me off. No, that's not how this works.

1047
00:51:30,119 --> 00:51:32,320
You found it. It's your perfewed decision. If you run,

1048
00:51:32,559 --> 00:51:35,760
leak or fight, She regarded, the woods, face pale in

1049
00:51:35,840 --> 00:51:38,199
the beam. We have to go service, tunnel is nor

1050
00:51:38,239 --> 00:51:41,360
a third cypress over one chance. I followed as she

1051
00:51:41,400 --> 00:51:43,519
knife through the nettles, the woods alive with a million

1052
00:51:43,559 --> 00:51:46,360
and name sounds, branches breaking wind, carrying voices that might

1053
00:51:46,400 --> 00:51:49,159
have been ordinary or might have been warnings. We found

1054
00:51:49,159 --> 00:51:52,679
the tunnel short steel, robed, one encave with stones. She

1055
00:51:52,760 --> 00:51:55,960
dropped to her knees, paying a loose grating aside. I hesitated,

1056
00:51:56,039 --> 00:51:58,519
then ducked after her. The world up a shrank to

1057
00:51:58,559 --> 00:52:01,639
a stripe of broken minlight under the roadway. The tunnel

1058
00:52:01,679 --> 00:52:04,639
stank of rotten water, rust and oil. A sensory assault.

1059
00:52:05,280 --> 00:52:07,920
I was on hands and knees, bag scraping, a long

1060
00:52:08,039 --> 00:52:10,639
reassurance only in the rough presence of another human nearby.

1061
00:52:11,320 --> 00:52:13,679
Half Way through, Noah's thundered behind a pair of boots

1062
00:52:13,679 --> 00:52:16,079
on the asphalt, voices raised in what could have been pursued.

1063
00:52:16,719 --> 00:52:20,400
I shudder, but pushed on adrenaline overriding terror. My hands

1064
00:52:20,400 --> 00:52:24,159
slipped on greasy stones. The cam quarridor fretted against my ribs.

1065
00:52:24,840 --> 00:52:27,320
At the far end, she twisted another great loose, hauling

1066
00:52:27,320 --> 00:52:29,000
me up on to a strip of service road between

1067
00:52:29,000 --> 00:52:32,719
trees and a second empty depot lot head lights flickered beyond.

1068
00:52:33,480 --> 00:52:36,440
She pointed down the darkened service lane. The girl, I'll

1069
00:52:36,480 --> 00:52:38,559
lead them this way. You run, This is your window.

1070
00:52:38,679 --> 00:52:41,400
Don't look back. Before I could thank her, she was gone,

1071
00:52:41,440 --> 00:52:44,800
moving with the practice, vanish into the brush. Our flashlight darkened,

1072
00:52:45,400 --> 00:52:48,679
The boots behind us faded into distant echoes. My feet

1073
00:52:48,679 --> 00:52:51,960
pounded the ripple pavement, lungs full of corrosive air. My

1074
00:52:52,079 --> 00:52:54,719
mind shurned dozens of images all at once, the circles

1075
00:52:54,760 --> 00:52:57,079
glowing in the gas, the cassette taped slick was sweat,

1076
00:52:57,119 --> 00:53:00,119
my brother's name, echoing down rows of empty seats. When

1077
00:53:00,159 --> 00:53:03,039
the city lies finally welled up ahead, yellow white and indifferent,

1078
00:53:03,079 --> 00:53:06,320
I stopped my hands, tingled, skin buzzing hot, as if

1079
00:53:06,320 --> 00:53:09,599
the adrenaline at gun caustic. I slipped the messenger bag

1080
00:53:09,639 --> 00:53:13,119
off my shoulder, checked everything breathable and broken. Evidence and

1081
00:53:13,159 --> 00:53:17,199
trollman sipped tight together. I turned, scanned the woods. No

1082
00:53:17,280 --> 00:53:20,719
one followed. The road stretched ahead, silent except for one

1083
00:53:20,760 --> 00:53:25,119
distant BUSU marked. My phone vibrated a string of new messages,

1084
00:53:25,199 --> 00:53:27,880
this time from LEO, punctuated with you O K. Then

1085
00:53:28,159 --> 00:53:30,880
lines blowing out police everywhere. You won't see Netty boat

1086
00:53:30,960 --> 00:53:34,719
right a later one more solemn proofs already out. People

1087
00:53:34,719 --> 00:53:38,039
are listening. I fumbled out a breathing laugh. The events

1088
00:53:38,039 --> 00:53:41,039
of the last I vibrated behind my eyes. I turned

1089
00:53:41,039 --> 00:53:44,360
east toward the city. Proper sirens pullsed on the horizon,

1090
00:53:44,440 --> 00:53:46,920
but I faded into the night and nobody, again, defined

1091
00:53:46,920 --> 00:53:50,280
by anonymity more than by evidence. Not far from my apartment,

1092
00:53:50,360 --> 00:53:52,880
city lives warmed an you fu reescent diners half shutter,

1093
00:53:53,000 --> 00:53:55,039
the hiss of distant traffic covering any memory of the

1094
00:53:55,079 --> 00:53:58,079
woods in a bathroom stalled a bus terminal five miles

1095
00:53:58,079 --> 00:54:00,159
from Elbridge. I locked the door, thumb my fe owing

1096
00:54:00,199 --> 00:54:03,360
to your record, and whispered a final memo for the audiophile, proved,

1097
00:54:03,360 --> 00:54:06,360
secured names attached, Send to every firebrant and paper. Fearless

1098
00:54:06,440 --> 00:54:08,119
enough to run with it. If anyone hears this, if

1099
00:54:08,159 --> 00:54:10,440
it's not just me, don't take the last ride, not now.

1100
00:54:11,079 --> 00:54:14,039
I uploaded the recording to Leo tortrusted online account, and

1101
00:54:14,119 --> 00:54:17,000
finally to a news producer I only half knew don

1102
00:54:17,760 --> 00:54:20,239
I zipped my back, splashed my face, and stepped back

1103
00:54:20,239 --> 00:54:22,320
into the noise. In the lights and impatience of the city.

1104
00:54:22,880 --> 00:54:24,639
The lines on my pump felt burned, and from one

1105
00:54:24,679 --> 00:54:27,639
two minny night of clutching journal's cossettes helped stolen from

1106
00:54:27,679 --> 00:54:31,480
others disappearances. For a hundred yards, every passing bus seemed

1107
00:54:31,480 --> 00:54:34,039
to glance in my direction, none of them slowing, none

1108
00:54:34,079 --> 00:54:36,679
of them marked. But the feeling didn't leave that at

1109
00:54:36,719 --> 00:54:39,440
any given moment the world's machinery could choke a secret again.

1110
00:54:40,000 --> 00:54:42,639
I pressed forward through the city blocks, none but alerte.

1111
00:54:43,119 --> 00:54:45,519
In the last hour before sunrise, I reached my building,

1112
00:54:46,079 --> 00:54:48,280
the doors that could behind me see closing, not with

1113
00:54:48,360 --> 00:54:51,199
peace but a hell breath. In the silence of my kitchen,

1114
00:54:51,280 --> 00:54:53,440
I sat facing the window, the thin gray rooft of

1115
00:54:53,480 --> 00:54:55,960
morning yawning out the sky line. At the far end

1116
00:54:56,000 --> 00:55:00,159
of the block, a tremlumbertop pause breaks, sighing. I glanced down,

1117
00:55:00,199 --> 00:55:02,639
striped with dirt and dried blood from kneeling in tunnel mulk.

1118
00:55:03,360 --> 00:55:06,079
The cassettes remains it in my lap, evidence in curs both.

1119
00:55:06,719 --> 00:55:09,000
I looked beyond the glass to the street below, idly

1120
00:55:09,039 --> 00:55:14,280
cataloging the bus stops. Then my eyes snagged there, almost invisible,

1121
00:55:14,280 --> 00:55:16,280
beneath the swirl of old mark attacks at the base

1122
00:55:16,320 --> 00:55:18,719
of the tramps shelter were two of lapping circles, and

1123
00:55:19,039 --> 00:55:22,119
faintly a third depended like an afterthought. They've been scratched

1124
00:55:22,119 --> 00:55:25,760
and hurriedly freshly the mark truck me here. The last

1125
00:55:25,760 --> 00:55:29,480
thought roseen bidden, certain the circle was unbroken. I pressed

1126
00:55:29,480 --> 00:55:31,760
my forehead to the cool glass, breathing the city's noise

1127
00:55:31,800 --> 00:55:34,079
and grime, feeling the shape of everything that couldn't be

1128
00:55:34,079 --> 00:55:37,400
contained in stories or proof or even blow ties. That

1129
00:55:37,519 --> 00:55:41,280
was how it ended, and that is the end. Thank

1130
00:55:41,320 --> 00:55:42,880
you for listening, and I will see you in the

1131
00:55:42,920 --> 00:55:51,400
next one.