The gentle omnipresent rhythm of the road beneath the tires seemed of a piece with the night itself. Low and dark; as oddly comforting as it was vast and lonely; and nearly eternal—broken only by the occasional lane change or brief collision with a rumble strip in the case of the former, and by the illuminated signs and roadside lights which cut through the latter, seeming to hang at odd angles halfway to the pitch-dark sky.

There had been no roads like this on Gongen. The highways of America, on this parallel Earth in a distant past, were a much vaster and stranger network than any streets Jhe Sang Mi had ever travelled back home. Liminal. Liminal and lonely, especially after nightfall. There was a sense of total isolation out here, traversing the endless miles between destinations, one which was only intensified by the occasional reminders of human existence—the brief flicker of headlights from a passing car, the burning orange-on-black notice signs looming from the roadside, the occasional oasis of light stretched around a gas station or convenience store. Reminders which only served to bring the emptiness into starker relief. It was somehow hard to imagine the architects of any of these signs and signals as fellow people. They were simply a distant and unnerving presence, casting messages out into the eerie silence—like strange shapes passing beneath dark waters, or a fisherman’s lure dropping in from somewhere distant.

Sang Mi sighed, leaning her head up against the closed passenger-side window and letting the gentle vibrations and the meaningless smear of roadside lights draw her mind from such gloomy thoughts. A dark highway past midnight was no time or place for deep thinking, especially not for someone who’d spent the evening reading all the best and scariest of this Earth’s urban legends and creepypastas on the ancient mini-tablet device which Cwej had purchased. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. They had been encountering a lot of that sort of thing lately. It was good to be prepared.

​She glanced at Cwej, who was staring straight ahead through the front window, making occasional adjustments to the wheel. She wanted to speak to him to relieve some of the loneliness of the dark highway—but it was strangely difficult, at night, in a place like this. The easy chatter which filled their daylight adventures seemed to dissipate at this hour, replaced with a soft and vaguely stifling veil which was nearly impossible to penetrate. It felt wrong to try to talk, this late at night. Their mutual state of awakeness was merely a practical necessity brought about by the strange realm that was the highway, one which it seemed somehow rude to acknowledge.

It was odd, she supposed, that the night should seem so lonely with her friend by her side. But the melancholy feeling was there nonetheless. A road, after all, was nothing more than an extension of its inevitable end. Every further mile that they travelled, the pressing awareness that their travels would soon be over weighed ever more heavily on Sang Mi’s mind.

There was something comforting about travelling with Cwej. They understood each other, in a way that was unique among her friendships. There were parts of herself, and of her life, that Sang Mi didn’t like, and she suspected that the same was true of Cwej. But when they were with each other— things seemed more balanced, somehow. More manageable. More able to be overcome. But the fundamental truth of their time together was that it couldn’t last forever.

They were from different worlds, she and Cwej—different universes and times altogether, but also different lives. At the end of the day, she still had school, and friends, and things which she simply couldn’t put on hold forever to travel the multiverse. Not to mention an uncertain future to face after that, the same which faced all of Gongen. And Cwej—Cwej had responsibilities which she still didn’t fully understand, to Superiors whose identities she still couldn’t quite grasp. Massive responsibilities, cosmic responsibilities - responsibilities which this final road trip could only delay for so long. Soon, very soon, their time together would end. And while that was a truth which Sang Mi had assured herself she could face, it wasn’t a truth which she could face at two in the morning on the loneliest highway in the world. Not without letting that eerie melancholy feeling creep in.

The car jolted lightly as Cwej changed lanes, snapping Sang Mi once more from her silent ruminations. It was getting hot in the rubberized interior of this awful orange cube, she realized. She cracked the window, letting a fast-rushing burst of cool air hit her face, bringing with it the smell of gasoline and distant fried food and, somewhere beneath it all, the fresh scent of a summer night. She sighed. It reminded her of nostalgic nights on Gongen, time spent with dear friends. But just now, the thought of being back on Gongen was a sad one. It was an odd feeling, to think of her life and her friends that way. But it was difficult to avoid.

The glowing orange sign ahead read ‘Slow Down. Sharp Turn Approaching.’ Cwej leaned smoothly into the curve, then reached to turn on the radio. In the few seconds before the sign vanished from view, Sang Mi glanced back at it and read the words ‘Fueling Up Ahead. Don’t Want to Show Up at Simone’s on Empty. I’m Not Staying.’ Then it was lost in the darkness behind them.

But those signs didn’t change. And what kind of message was that, anyway?

Static flared on the radio for a moment, snatches of random stations coming through. Cwej cursed lightly. The primitive device was never able to pick up a signal this far out—Sang Mi had realized that by now. They’d picked up a few CDs at a second-hand store called Sullivan’s Curios, but those were still wrapped up in a bag in the back, alongside the projector which they still had yet to deliver. Sang Mi sat back in her seat, intending to let the rumble of the tires lull her to sleep.

The radio static suddenly pared into sharpness, the notes of a twentieth-century synth-pop song dancing forth into the night. She glanced at Cwej, hoping that the familiarity of their now-usual routine would break the awkward silence. He hesitated for a moment, listening, then shook his head.

“Nope,” he said in Korean, his voice husky with tiredness. “Too old. Space Age music all sounds the same to me.”

Sang Mi nodded, biting her lip as she listened to the song herself, trying to remember. She’d taken a class on twentieth-century popular media at Academy 27, and several of her friends were, as she’d have happily teased them, notorious nerds who had assailed her with music of approximately this vintage countless times. But in her case, their little contest had the added complication that any given song which might play on the radio station of this past era might simply not ever have existed at all in her universe.
After a few more seconds, she had it. They’d definitely covered this one during the Anglo- American unit, and it helped that the English title was right there in the lyrics.

“‘Always Something There to Remind Me’,” she proudly announced. “By…” She faltered. “I don’t know,” she admitted, scrambling for vaguely-remembered names. “…Duran Duran? Måneskin? Punchdown Krone?”

“The Naked Eyes!” Cwej exclaimed, snapping his fingers triumphantly. “I remember that one now!”

Sang Mi crossed her arms playfully. Cwej might have hailed from even further ahead of this era than she did, but he had the advantage of regular time travel under his belt, and she didn’t.

She didn’t.

She wasn’t part of that world. And it was going to have to carry on without her, soon enough.

Feeling the melancholy tendrils creeping around her again, Sang Mi leaned back in her seat. The chorus of the song blared on as she finally let the rumble of the road carry her off to sleep.

* * *

Careful to keep glancing back at the road ahead, Cara lifted the worn old cassette from the centre console compartment and popped it into the tape deck, pressing play. She needed music right now. And ‘Always Something There to Remind Me’ seemed fitting. Happy that she’d rewound after the last time she’d listened to it—it was easy to remember when she only ever wanted to listen to the first song on the tape anyway—she let the music wash through the car as she turned onto a sudden dirt pathway and began the bumpy crawl towards the second-hand store which she’d discovered the day before. Simone had always made fun of her for her intensely mainstream taste in music—she was more of the Bikini Kill and Team Dresch persuasion of cutting-edge punk rock, while Cara couldn’t stand the stuff—but honestly, she’d never minded. It was hard for her to mind anything that Simone did.

But there was no point in thinking about that. That was in the past. Almost. It would be, soon enough. After she’d taken care of this one last thing.

Pulling the car to a stop by the side of the path as the clanging synths of the song chimed, she pushed the door open and hopped down onto the gravel which lined the drive. The tiny shop— Sullivan’s Curios—was almost a mile from her parents’ town, and she wanted to be on the highway before sundown—but she hadn’t had her wallet with her when she’d taken a nostalgic last look around yesterday afternoon, and there was something in the shop that she needed. She only hoped it hadn’t sold. But given how empty the place had been both times she’d seen it, that didn’t seem like much of a possibility.

The ring of the bell as she pushed the door open alerted the shopkeeper, a cranky man in his mid-forties who’d refused to set anything aside for her, even when she’d promised to be back the next day. He frowned irritatedly, then returned to his paper. Cara nodded briskly back, then made directly for the shelves in the far corner.

It was still there. Relieved, Cara hefted the heavy wooden deer from its place near the top, leaving its matching double behind. She ran a finger along the dust-encrusted details; the careful lines of its muzzle and hooves. The adhesive sticker on the underside declared a price of thirty dollars, which was steep—but worth it, she thought. Fastening her grip around the middle of the sculpture, she lugged it back to the counter and placed it in front of the shopkeeper, wincing slightly at the fortunately-unwarranted thought that it might shatter the glass surface, then fished the money out of her wallet.

“This is a real classic piece,” the man said as he counted the money, as if vaguely suspicious that Cara was not the right buyer for such an item. “There’s a matching one, you know. I’d really have preferred to sell them as a set…”

“I can’t afford both,” Cara replied. “Is that a problem?” The man hesitated for a moment.

“I suppose not…” the man replied, frowning as he wrapped the deer in newspaper. “But take care of it, will ya?”

She nodded, looking out through the transom window. The light was waning. It was time to go.

Back outside, she set the deer gingerly on the gravel, then popped the trunk. There was still a little space left next to all of her earthly possessions. She slid the deer in, newspaper and all, and pushed the lid shut. Back in the front seat, she started the tape playing again, and put the car into drive, turning back onto the dirt path and starting for the main road. The highway beckoned. She shuffled her hand around in the cup holder—enough change there to handle the upcoming toll booths. With any luck, she’d be at her new apartment by Thursday. Just one small detour to make first…

* * *

Sang Mi woke up, feeling an ache all down her back. That was the problem with sleeping while on the road, she thought—it wasn’t nearly as comfortable as a motel, not that those were the height of luxury either. But they’d planned to drive this night through and only stop for a rest come the next afternoon, a plan which had seemed entirely sensible in the cheerful light of morning.

She peered through the front window. Cwej had slowed the car to turn into a gas station, which was probably what had jolted her from her uneasy slumber. The lot was eerily empty. They pulled up between two pumps, and Chris leaned out the window, squinting at the prices. Rubbing her eyes, Sang Mi turned up the radio, hoping that they were now close enough to inhabited civilisation to have a choice of channels. There was a brief burst of static, and then it resolved into the distinctive opening notes of ‘Always Something There to Remind Me’.

“This again?” she asked. Cwej glanced over.

“Yeah, still static,” he answered. “Sorry.”

He pushed open the driver’s-side door, then stepped out.

“I won’t be long,” he continued, before pushing the door shut again.

Sang Mi frowned—what had he meant by ‘still static’? Still mildly unnerved by her earlier reading, she turned the radio off again, then glanced out the window. Cwej waved to her from the pump as he began filling up the tank. She waved back, then sat back in her seat, gazing out into the darkness. It was eerily black beyond the great overhead lights of the gas station—a silent wilderness, in which anything at all might lurk. One keenly felt the sense that this was an outpost in the wasteland; a fragile oasis surrounded by vast and unknowable things.

Sang Mi shook her head, resolving not to read any more scary stories for the duration of the trip. Probably best to try to sleep again, she thought, uncomfortable as it was. She settled in her seat and stretched her legs into the space beneath the dashboard, gazing vaguely through the window towards the starless ink of the sky above and listening to the soft clunk of the fuel nozzle in the gas tank. She let her eyes flicker from the lightly-glowing dials behind the wheel to the blinking radio clock to the rearview mirror above the window, in which she could see the row of gas pumps stretching out into the darkness behind the car.

Something tingled oddly in her peripheral vision as she stared through the reflected back-window. She sat up again. Her heart beating faster, though she didn’t yet know why, Sang Mi shifted her gaze to the reflected forms of the backseat headrests which loomed behind her. There was something else in front of the one directly at her back, another form, partially obscuring her view.

Someone.

“Cwej!” she called, whipping fearfully around to look in the backseat. “There’s—”

There was no one there. She turned back to look in the rearview mirror again, and saw only empty seats.

Cwej pulled open the door, looking concerned. “What is it?” he asked. “Are you alright?”

Sang Mi looked in the backseat again, still seeing nothing out of the ordinary.

“There was someone in the car,” she said. “In the mirror, anyway. Behind me, in the back seat.”

“Damn it,” Cwej replied. “Was it another… thing? Another one of these things?”

“Creepypastas,” Sang Mi put in, nodding. “I’m not calling them that,” Cwej said.

Stepping out, he took the fuel pump out of the car and got back in, then glanced in the mirror himself.

“After your time?” Sang Mi asked.

“Before,” he groaned. “You sound like a period novel.” Sang Mi crossed her arms.

“It had a comeback,” she said. “Part of my gen’s slang.”

“And my grandma’s gen’s,” Cwej replied. “So… are we haunted, then?” Sang Mi watched the mirror for a moment more.

“No, maybe not,” she replied. “I’m really tired. I think I might have just imagined it. But I’ll let you know if there’s anything else.”

Cwej nodded.

“Well, get some rest,” he said. “We still have a ways to go.”

That was good, Sang Mi thought, as she settled back in her seat. That was very good.

When next she awoke, there was a line of unmanned toll booths stretching across several lanes ahead, lights flashing and gates down. A white-on-green sign proclaimed that the cost was $1.90, and also instructed passengers to have their money ready, an instruction which Cwej was rapidly attempting to obey as he fumbled in his wallet for the required change.

“They really charge people to use the roads?” Sang Mi asked drowsily. “I knew Earth was capitalist, but this is ridiculous.”

“I just can’t believe it isn’t all electronic yet,” Cwej mumbled back. “These must be the last vestiges.”

The car approached the toll booth, and Cwej rolled his window down to put the money into the tray. A few moments passed in silence, the gate not raising—then the booth speaker crackled on.

“Sorry for the delay,” came a pre-recorded voice in overly-cheerful tones. “Please wait.” Then there was silence again.

“Now what?” Sang Mi asked. Cwej shrugged.

“Hope it opens, I suppose?” he said, with a touch of weariness in his voice. He patted the wheel. “That or I’ll drive on through the gate and see what happens.”

Sang Mi laughed.

Outside the window, the toll booth speaker crackled on again, and Sang Mi strained to listen. But it wasn’t the pre-recorded voice this time. It was a woman’s voice, faded and fragmented—hard to make out.

“Can’t stay too long,” Sang Mi heard the voice mutter. “But I need to deliver it.” “What?” she said aloud, unsure whether she was speaking to the voice or to Cwej.

“It’s important,” the static-choked voice murmured. “We won’t see each other again. I can’t let her forget me.”

The speaker fell silent.

“Did you say something?” Cwej asked, looking up from the awful book of jokes which he’d bought at Sullivan’s Curios. He had been reading to pass the time whenever they had nothing to do.

“I was just wondering what the heck the speaker was saying.” She frowned. “…You did hear it, right?”

“After the first time, you mean?” Cwej asked, looking mildly concerned. “No, I didn’t hear anything else. Did you?”

The speaker crackled again.

“Going to turn off at the convenience store a few miles from here,” came the voice. “Then straight on till morning. Can’t let her forget.”

There was a pause.

“Please help me,” said the voice. “Our time is ending. Don’t let her forget.”

“Sang Mi?” Cwej repeated, concerned.

Sang Mi was silent for a moment, thinking. Something in the strange voice’s plea had struck a chord for her. Whatever it was, it sounded like it really did need help.

“Yeah, I did,” Sang Mi finally replied. “There was a voice. Talking to me, asking for help.” “Uh oh,” Cwej said wearily. “That doesn’t sound like the best of news.”

“No, I know,” Sang Mi said. “But it sounded… genuine. Is there a convenience store up ahead?” Cwej unfolded his map.

“Yes,” he replied. “A few miles on. Why?”

Sang Mi hesitated for a moment. “I think we should stop there. That’s what the voice was saying, and I kind of want to check it out.”

“Are you sure?” Cwej asked. “We could have an anglerfish situation on our hands.”

Sang Mi nodded. “I know,” she said. “But we can handle that, right?”

Cwej grinned. “Oh, yes,” he laughed. “Together, I’m sure we could.”

Outside, the speaker crackled on again. Sang Mi listened for the voice—but it was the automated message, instead.

“All set!” it chimed. “Please move up.”

The gate lifted, and Cwej put the car into drive, picking up speed as he left the toll booth behind.

Yes, Sang Mi thought, staring ahead—together, they probably could. Together, they could probably do anything.

But their time was ending. She sighed, then turned up the radio to hear the sounds of ‘Always Something There to Remind Me’.

* * *

Cara stepped through the automatic doors of the convenience store, nodding to the tired-looking young woman at the counter. She needed the bathroom, and a map.

The first of her tasks completed, she crumpled up the paper seat cover (you couldn’t be too careful) and began to wash her hands at the only sink in the tiny convenience store restroom. Staring blankly at her own reflection in the mirror beneath the harsh unnatural lighting, Cara felt her thoughts drifting inexorably back towards Simone. Both a longing for the past, and a mild dread of the future. Those days weren’t behind her yet—she was still going to see Simone, one more time. And the thought that the end of the most important relationship of her life was still approaching even as it was long over made her feel mildly nauseated. Maybe it would be better if that end never arrived, she thought. Maybe it would be better to travel the final road forever, and never quite reach its finish. Delay the journey’s end into eternity, and always remain in the moment before the close.

She splashed water in her face, then stepped back into the convenience store proper. She put a quarter into an arcade machine called Blox Stacker and quickly lost, then took a map from the rack and brought it to the counter. The clerk took her money with one hand, sipping boredly at a cherry cola held in the other. Cara glanced down at the row of newspapers beneath the counter. At Fifth Avenue Parade, Thousands Celebrate Gay Pride, proclaimed the New York Times, halfway down the page beneath a headline announcing the death of Warren Burger. She looked away, busying herself with the map.

A shelf of tacky souvenirs caught her eye, and she sidled aimlessly over to it. Cheap keychains and bumper stickers. Items meant to be introduced into a journey solely for the purpose of serving as eventual mementoes of it. Premature earthly remnants of something which was not yet quite over. To buy a souvenir was to declare the present moment past before you could even see the end of it.

But then, you could always see the end of a road. It was all around you, down the whole length of it. Souvenirs made sense, Cara supposed. Things always ended, no matter how great they were, and then they faded away. And when they ceased to be present, they were inevitably forgotten. Unless you preserved the remnants—encased them in a little plastic trinket, a totem of the past, which could spark the last little flecks of memory.
Of course, it didn’t have to be plastic. And, she thought ruefully, it didn’t have to be cheap. Tucking the map into her pocket, she headed back towards the doors. She had a deer to deliver.

* * *

“Don’t mix all of those flavors,” Cwej said.

“Why not?” Sang Mi asked, as she ran her hand along the row of dispensing levers on the convenience store slushie machine, depositing a pump of each into her plastic cup.
“It won’t taste good,” Cwej replied, shaking his head, as Sang Mi popped the cap on and put in the straw. “So… this toll booth voice. What was it saying?”

“She said she needed help delivering something,” she said. “Because… because she was afraid that she was going to be forgotten. And she said she was going to this convenience store.”

She took a sip of her slushie, then cringed at the taste.

“It just sounded like she really needed help,” she continued. “Even if she was a demon or something. So… I don’t know. I’m going to take a look around.”

Cwej nodded.

“Alright,” he said. “Be careful. And don’t wander off. I need the toilet.”

Now alone but for the clerk, Sang Mi cast her gaze around the store. The speakers were playing ‘Always Something There to Remind Me’, faintly. Nothing much out of the ordinary—except for one thing which caught her eye: a battered old arcade machine with the words ‘Blox Stacker’ painted at the top. The screen was flashing and flickering strangely. She drew closer. The falling blocks of pixels had formed themselves into rows, and were gnashing like teeth. Sang Mi fished a quarter from her pocket and put it into the machine, and the blocks vanished—replaced by words.

HELP ME, they read. I NEED HELP.

“Who are you?” Sang Mi asked, leaning closer.

I NEED HELP, the pixels spelled. OUR TIME IS ENDING. BUT I WANT HER TO REMEMBER ME.

“I understand,” Sang Mi said. “But you have to tell me more.” SIMONE, read the screen. SHE NEEDS TO HAVE THIS.

The words split apart, and the pixels reformed themselves into the image of a deer. Sang Mi’s eyes widened.

I’m CHECKING INTO THREADS BUDGET MOTEL, said the pixels. AND THEN ON TO HER HOUSE. BUT I NEED H E L P…

An address flashed on the screen. Then the screen flashed, and went out.

“Everything alright?” Cwej asked, appearing behind Sang Mi. She jumped, then nodded.

“Yes,” she said. “I think so. But we need to go to the Threads Budget Motel.”

Cwej frowned.

“But we have a reservation at-”

“I know,” she interrupted. “But I think it’s important.”

She strode towards the doors, then paused and turned to the clerk. “Do you know where Threads Budget Motel is?” she asked.

The clerk frowned.

“Just a few exits from here, I think,” she replied. “I haven’t heard anyone mention that place in ages.”

Sang Mi thanked her, put her unappealing brown slushie into the trash, then turned to walk through the doors. As she did, she caught a strange sight reflected in the glass—a woman whom she didn’t recognize, blurred and distant.

Sang Mi nodded to her, then stepped through the doors, Cwej following closely behind.

* * *

Walking through the fog of chlorine which clung to the carpeting outside the room housing the shabby motel pool, Cara approached the front desk of the Threads Budget Motel. The desk clerk was typing on a bulky beige IBM, working beneath the crackling flicker of a sparking ceiling light on a cheap countertop which had seen better days.

“Check in?” she asked.

“Yes,” Cara replied, handing over her ID. “I have a reservation.” The clerk glanced at the ID, then nodded and handed it back. “Second floor,” she said. “Room 220.”

Upstairs, sitting on her bed, Cara found that the TV flickered on and off just as much as all of the lights did. Sighing, she turned it off, then lay silently in the darkness.

It shouldn’t have been like this. She was moving into a new city in just a day. A new apartment, a new job, a new life. It should have been good. Except, of course, that it couldn’t possibly have been.

She couldn’t be with Simone. Not in this life. Not if she wanted to have a life. But a life without Simone was no life anyway.

Things were changing, Simone had said. Things wouldn’t be the way they were now forever. But Cara couldn’t quite believe that. Maybe things would be different someday, but she couldn’t see the end from where she stood now.

Her time with Simone was coming to an end, and it hurt terribly. But she couldn’t bear the thought of it all fading away. She patted the wooden deer from Sullivan’s Curios, which was sitting on the bedside table. A deer, just as they’d seen on their first hike together. A memento. A remnant. A souvenir. One last stop.

Cara turned off the flickering lights and went to sleep.

* * *

Sang Mi stared in shock at the burnt-out wreck which stood before her.

“Yeah, this was it,” the jogger they’d stopped was saying. “Threads. Big deal when I was a kid, I remember. Thirty years ago this month, actually. Some kind of electrical problem.”

Sang Mi shared a concerned glance with Cwej, then turned back to the jogger. “And… everyone died?” she asked.

The jogger frowned awkwardly, rubbing at her head. “Well, yeah, I’m afraid so,” she replied. “Awful.” Cwej nodded.

“Thank you.”

“No problem,” the jogger replied, heading up the road again. They stood in silence for a moment.

“Well… I guess it was a ghost,” Cwej said.

“Yeah, but—she needed help,” Sang Mi replied. “She needed to deliver something. A deer.” Cwej nodded.

“I know, but—I doubt anything she needed to deliver survived this,” he said sadly.

Sang Mi mirrored his nod.

“I guess you’re right,” she said. “I guess Simone will have forgotten her, whoever she was.” “Why do you say that?” Cwej asked.

Sang Mi felt tears welling in her eyes.

“Because… because their time came to an end,” she replied. “That’s what she was saying. It ended, because it had to end. And now it can never begin again. I don’t know.”

She wiped her eyes on her sleeve. “Sang Mi—” Cwej began, concerned.

Something caught Sang Mi’s eyes among the rubble, and she ran to it, then pulled it from the wreckage. It was a board—a board with words burned into it. She patted the wooden deer from Sullivan’s Curios, which was sitting on the bedside table, the ashes spelled. Cara hefted the heavy wooden deer from its place near the top, leaving its matching double behind, they said in another place.

She looked at it for a moment. Then her eyes widened.

“Cwej!” she said, determination setting in again. “We need to go back to Sullivan’s Curios!” “What?” Cwej asked. “But that was half a day back!”

She ran to the car.

“We have to,” she said. “And then… we’re going to Simone’s house.”

* * *

As the chiming tones of ‘Always Something There to Remind Me’ faded out for the hundredth time, Cwej stopped the car by the house bearing the address which Sang Mi had glimpsed on an arcade machine’s screen. Sang Mi popped open the door, hauling the heavy wooden deer—marked up to $70 after three decades on a shelf—along with her.

“Are you sure about this?” Cwej called.

“Always,” Sang Mi replied, marching up to the door. She rang the bell.
​
A woman in her 60s opened the door, then looked confusedly at Sang Mi. “Are you Simone?” Sang Mi asked in English.
​
“Yes?” the woman replied. “Do I know you?” Sang Mi took a breath.

“Don’t ask me how,” she said, lifting the deer as high as she could manage, “But this is supposed to be a gift from—”

“Cara,” the woman breathed, tears shining in her eyes. Sang Mi nodded, setting the deer down on the doorstep. “You remember,” she said. “I… wasn’t sure you would.”

“Always,” Simone replied. “It’s been thirty years. But she’ll always be a part of me.” She lifted the sculpture.

“We loved deer,” she said wistfully. “So do I,” Sang Mi said, nodding. Simone smiled.

“Then you should have it,” she said, putting the deer back into Sang Mi’s arms. “Wh—but what about—?”

“You drove all this way,” Simone said, nodding to Cwej, who waved back. “Damned if I know how or why. But you deserve it. I’ve got something better: all the memories.”

* * *

Back in the car, Sang Mi sat quietly for a while as Cwej drove away, on towards their next destination.

“Cwej,” she said at last, holding up the deer. “I want you to have this.” Cwej chuckled.

“Nope,” he replied. “You’re stuck with that thing now.” He paused, then sighed.

“Look, Sang Mi,” he said. “Everything has to end eventually. But—that woman was right. We’ll always have the memories.”

Sang Mi nodded. “Yeah. I know.”

Cwej smiled. “I’ve been around a bit. So take it from me: you don’t need souvenirs,” he said. “Because the journey never really ends. There’ll always be a little piece of us left travelling these roads forever.”

Sang Mi smiled back.

“Then let’s make sure it’s a really good one,” she said.

“You know, I’ll bet we could get some actual radio stations out here,” Cwej said. He turned on the radio.

They roared down the highways of America beneath the rays of the shining sun, ‘Always Something There to Remind Me’ playing at full blast.

Copyright © 2025 Arcbeatle Press
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental or has been done firmly within the bounds of parody and fair use.
Edited by James Wylder, James Hornby & Aristide Twain
Formatting and design by James Wylder & Aristide Twain
Cover by Leela Ross Logo design by Lucas Kovacs

Concepts Used with Permission:
Academy 27 © Arcbeatle Press
Coloth © Simon Bucher-Jones
WARSONG, WARS TCG, Gongen, Takumi, and associated concepts © Decipher, Inc.
SIGNET and Charles Zoltan © James Hornby
Chris Cwej and associated concepts © Andy Lane
Yssgaroth © Neil Penswick
C.R.U.X © Aristide Twain
Lady Aesculapius, Blanche Combine, Jhe Sang Mi © James Wylder ​

​The haze of the early morning sun filtered through the grease-stained windows of The Horned Bull as Rodney was guided to his high-top seat by a young waitress—young enough to be his daughter. She introduced herself, in a broad Appalachian accent, as Anna-Mae.

“I’m new here,” she went on, while sunlight sparkled in her dyed ash-blonde hair as he looked, fixated, at her chest. She downplayed her discomfort and continued her job, taking his order—a disappointingly ordinary request of ham and eggs on toast, and a cola to drink—which was the same meal Rodney had ordered virtually every morning for far too many decades to remember. Rodney liked predictability, although he wasn’t so much as organized; he was the type to meander through life, uninspired for anything grand.

He had wasted most of his life, never being one to take chances. He had never loved, always too afraid to ask girls out in his youth—or now, and spent his life alone, miserable, in a dead-end job. He made little money, had few possessions that meant anything to him, and his family had died long ago. He had no pets. The only thing he did was sit on his couch, beer and chicken tenders in hand, watching late-night reruns.
He wasn’t unique. There were a million people like him. His hair was grey and thin, skin ruddy and fattened, his clothing unremarkable. Just stained jeans and t-shirts.

There weren’t many people in The Horned Bull at this hour, much less anyone he recognized. Even as insular as Rodney could be, all he recognized were the cowboy Miller brothers who claimed to be plumbers, who once somehow made his already broken sink trap spew dirty, smelly water all over his kitchen.

The bar itself was nothing amazing. It was a shabby-looking place, paint peeling, yellowed and faded, tabletops scratched and the varnish worn away, the fake wooden floor tacky as one stepped on it, and all illuminated by sickly orange bulbs. But the food was serviceable, and that’s what mattered to Rodney.

All of a sudden, a woman sat herself besides Rodney, to his right, not even waiting for the waitress to greet her. Rodney paid her little attention, more focused on his rumbling stomach. After a minute, he realized that the woman hadn't called the waitress over, and he shot a sly look at her from the corner of his eye. He was taken aback by what he saw.

What stood out, most to him, was the fact she was dressed for a funeral; she was wearing a silken, voluminous, trailing gown, decorated with frills, lace and ruffles, with a thick, dense veil, preventing virtually any light from penetrating within. He let out a startled yelp, reminded of not only a horrible old hag from some late-night horror film, but of his long-dead, nasty, hateful grandmother, and he wasn’t entirely sure which scared him most. In the middle of his shocked reaction, his steel-toed boot collided with something hard on the floor, which was neither the bar- table or the stools. For what he had kicked, moved… and clanged. The woman stooped over, not saying a word, and shifted what he took to be some sort of box draped in a black cloth, one just as ominous as the fabric of the woman’s dress, to her side farthest away from him.

He reasserted himself, trying to make himself seem oblivious to his accident by looking around for the waitress, in a terribly unconvincing fashion that resembled a theatre kid who took themself to be far better at acting than they really were.

“That’s alright.” She spoke coolly, responding to an apology he hadn’t made. “Accidents happen.”

He turned slowly to face her, wincing in discomfort. He felt as if hot lights were shining directly on him, as if his body itself had welded itself to the cracked leather seat. A bead of sweat ran down his forehead and dripped onto his cheek. He was entirely unable to move.

“…you’re… going to a funeral, then?” he choked out, barely more than a whisper.
She continued to look at him, or at least Rodney guessed that she was, for it was hard to tell due to the veil, but didn’t say a word. Rodney tried another track, with even less confidence.

“I can call the waitress over?”

“That will hardly be necessary, for I am not hungry.”

“I—um, then, why are you here?” he asked, more intrusively than he wanted. He immediately regretted the action, although the woman continued to remain still.

She didn’t respond.

“You remind me of my grandmother,” he added after a while.

“Do I?” she finally responded. Rodney was torn between mild relief and yet more horror as the woman seemed to be interested with small talk. “What was she like?”

Rodney swore reflexively, then winced. “I hated her,” he explained. “She used to hit me, to punish me, even if I hadn’t done anything wrong. But I still get awful nightmares about her.” Rodney, normally, would not have been so open, even if anyone had cared enough about him to ask about his childhood. But now? He felt as if he was a nut that had been hit with a hammer, his innards crumbling out of his cracked shell.

“I guess we’re all haunted by the ghosts of our past,” the woman responded sagely after a long moment, in a surprisingly apologetic tone. “I suppose you could make amends. Perhaps you could do me a favor?”

“How would that benefit me?” he frowned.

Despite being unable to meet her eyes, he had the distinct feeling she was glaring at him. All of a sudden, he decided, whatever this woman’s request was, he’d do it just to get rid of her. She appeared to understand this, somehow, and continued:

“Shortly, two people will come here. One of them will be a man, tall in height, blonde in hair. The other a teenager, dark haired and much shorter. What I ask of you is simple: tell them about your ghosts.”

With that, the woman, as abruptly as she appeared, stood up, her box in arm, and left, the glass door swinging behind her. Rodney slumped forwards, head in hands, processing whatever the Hell it was that just happened to him. Perhaps he had fallen asleep? He knew that not to be true, and, to that effect, Anna-Mae asked where his friend had gone as she brought over his breakfast, telling him that as soon as she turned to take the completed meal from the chef, the woman had simply vanished.

* * *

“What a dump.”

Sang Mi was not impressed. Chris had decided that they should wake up early that morning, and thus her anxiety about falling asleep quickly the previous night resulted in her being entirely unable to sleep at all. It didn’t help that she swore that she saw a cockroach in the bathtub in the shabby motel they stayed at, a few miles west in the denser area of Louisville. They had been driving all day, that day, and only crossed into Kentucky as the sun set and bathed the city in an orange blanket.
 
Not only was she irritable with Chris for his stunt, it was all for nothing anyway, as they didn’t exactly have a schedule to stick to. A few minutes before she had said something to this effect, or perhaps, more accurately, snapped at him with cattiness atypical of her usual friendly nature. Chris had sensed his error and offered to take her to get a proper breakfast, something they had been unable to get so far on their trip.

“Come on, it’s not that bad. It has character! Look at that authentic, side-of-the-road diner aesthetic! A true nineteen-sixties throwback. Something straight out of a movie.”

“A horror movie, more like it. And it looks like it’s from the nineteen-sixties because,” she paused, gesticulating her arms towards the diner for dramatic effect, “It hasn’t been redecorated since the sixties. With our luck, Norman Bates will be taking our order and Leatherface cooking our rashers. Human rashers made from dumb teens.”

Chris shook and lowered his head in defeat and headed inside. Sang Mi wasn’t too far behind.

Inside, Sang Mi only had to take a quick glance at the sordid state of the eatery to look up at her friend and glare. Chris, unaware of the death stare, was simultaneously engaged in polite chatter with the waitress whilst being entirely oblivious to her flirtatious advances. She led them to a booth, asked them for their order, and began walking backwards before stumbling into a table and knocking over a bottle of ketchup. She hurried off in embarrassment.

“Dude, you do realize she was flirting with you?”

“No she wasn’t,” Chris said too confidently, then stopping to consider the possibility. “Was she?” Sang Mi rolled her eyes.

Chris was about to open his mouth to apologize again for the lack of sleep, but was interrupted when a greasy looking man sat next to him.

“I, uh, hi?” Chris offered a hand to shake; Rodney didn’t take it.

“I’ve been told that I need to tell you something. I wouldn’t normally talk to random folks like y’all, but this woman in this eerie black dress made me—” He stopped himself, realising he was sounding like a child, and changed his tune accordingly.

He began his tale of woe.

* * *

Many decades earlier, ten-year-old Rodney, on his brilliant blue bicycle, sped along Taylorsville Road, alongside his friend Michael, one wintery evening. Rodney’s blue bike was the subject of envy of his fellow pupils, which he reveled in. He took a lot of joy parading it around and showing off, as he had worked hard to save up for it, and this was the first time he had something to be proud of. He had spent the past three summers running errands for his neighbors, and, when needed, cutting their lawns and shoveling snow. Given his despondent home life, even his clothes were ratty and several sizes too small, and his parents couldn’t afford to buy him much of a daily lunch or school supplies; Rodney was often bullied, beaten and bruised, but he never seemed to let them get to him.

As the duo slowed down by the Pope Lick intersection, Michael suddenly had an idea.
“Hey Rod, I dare you to go onto the trestle bridge. For five minutes.” Michael had a wicked grin on his face, with the sharp angles of his sharp face illuminated by the cold sun.

“What, no!” Rodney argued. “That’s really dangerous! My old man told me never to go up there, or he’d hit me with his belt.”

“If you do, I’ll let you raid my candy jar…” Michael manipulated the situation, aware that Rodney never had the chance to have candy, especially as Michael always refused to share. It was a tempting offer and Rodney, pining for the taste of those chocolatey goods, couldn’t resist, even with the threat of his father’s punishments.

“You’ll have to leave your bike with me.” Michael tried pulling the blue bike from Rodney’s hands, but the poor child clung on.

“I, um, I’ll take it with me. On the bridge.” Rodney began to suspect his friend’s actual motive, but, as much as he didn’t want to believe it, he wasn’t going to take that chance. If Michael did take his bike, he’d have no chance of getting it back; Rodney’s father was a coward and a suck-up, and worse still Michael’s father was his boss.

They waited a while, without conversation, until a freight train thundered over the bridge. If a train was on the line, it would be a while before another came along. Rodney scrambled backwards up with the hill, dragging his bike behind him. The sun had now set and the area, shadowy, dark and cold, sent chills up his spine. He took a second to take in the reality of the situation, to see just how dumb he’d have to be to attempt this. He toed onto the railway track and inched closer to the beginning of the bridge, only now grasping just how high up he was. Worse still, there were gaps in the planks, so that he could see the earth beneath him, and there weren’t any sides to the bridge.

It was just a sheer drop down to the unforgiving, cruel ground below. “Do it then,” Michael taunted.

Preoccupied with fear, he hadn’t noticed Michael follow him up. “Mike, I’m really not sure about this. I wanna go home.” He pleaded.

“Too late, a dare’s a dare. And you wouldn’t want me to tell everyone you’re a chicken, are you? A wet, raggedy little chicken who’s too scared to even walk on a bridge?”

Rodney gulped, fortified himself, and began his treacherous feat.

Take one step, pull the bike close. Take on step, pull the bike close. Take one step, pull the bike close. Don’t look down. Don’t look down. Don’t look--

He looked down. Rodney was not quite midway across the bridge, but just over the creek. He wobbled. The world spun beneath him. He got down on his knees, grasping the rails for support. He felt like he was going to be sick.

He heard a laugh far below him. Michael had done a runner, got back on his bike, and hurried away at full speed.

Rodney was all alone.

The sun had fully set now and he was in near pitch blackness. He blindly fumbled with his schoolbag and retrieved his solid metal flashlight. Its dim orange glow did little to help, but he could just see the wooden beams beneath him.

He wept. He begged God for his mommy, but He didn’t answer and his mom didn’t save him. “He-eh-eh-eh-eh-ello?” came a voice, out of the void. Rodney tensed up, then began shaking as

he panned the torch around him. “He-eh-eh-eh-eh-eh-eh-eh-ello?”

Rodney’s mind had gone blank; he had forgotten how to move, how to crawl, how to flee. Thunk.

Thunk. Thunk.

Something was nearing him. Rodney swore it came from his left, so he jolted his flashlight in that direction, only to see the faint silhouette of a man bounding up the side of the steep bridge with impossible ease.

“He-eh-eh-eh-eh-ello?”

“Please, luh-leave m-me al-al-lone,” he wailed between sobs.

The shadowy figure flung himself onto the top of the bridge, crouching on all fours before standing up on his legs.

“Are you my frie-eh-eh-eh-eh-end?” the strange man called to him. If Rodney wasn’t any wiser, he would have thought that the man almost sounded… goat-like.

Rodney focused his flashlight towards the figure. The amber glow barely illuminated him, but Rodney could see that the man was only wearing pants; he was otherwise nude, but extremely hairy. Rodney then came to the realisation that the man’s pants were, in fact, not pants, but thick, bushy hair, not unlike the shaggy strands that covered the man’s head, face, chest and arms.

“I would really like a frie-eh-eh-eh-eh-end. I’m lone-eh-eh-eh-ly!”

The man’s legs were also weird. It wasn’t just the hair; they were bent, crooked, misshapen. The joints went all in the wrong directions.

Rodney sobbed harder.

The man only now sensed the boy’s fear and tried humming, as if he were a mother soothing her ailing baby, but this only freaked Rodney out more. Rodney let go of his bike and scrambled over it backwards, eyes and flashlight fixed on the being.

The man tried to follow him, his arms outstretched, attention likewise fixed on the boy, and this was his mistake. The man tripped over the bike. The bike tumbled off side, falling into the creek with a hefty splash. The man clung onto the side, hanging on with all his strength, but Rodney could see he was struggling. Rodney watched, petrified in fear, while the man’s fingers slipped, one by one.

A minute later, Rodney was all alone. An hour later, Rodney was still alone.

As the sun peaked, hours later, Rodney finally moved, and went back home.

He never again took any chances. He never took any risks. He never again hoped.

His spirit had been crushed, and a great guilt placed on his shoulders. He had realized, in the days and weeks that passed, after being grounded and punished by his father, that the man had meant him no harm, and had just been as lonely as he was.

And Rodney had not helped him.

* * *

Rodney’s version of the story had left out many of the details. Rodney hadn’t the strength to talk about his regrets, guilts and pains, and had only—in a frank and ineloquent manner—retold the tale hastily and cursorily.
​
As such, Chris was interested, but unsatisfied; he could tell there was more to the story, and hoped Rodney would elaborate, but nothing came, and he finished his coke.

“Well, I’ve done my part. I’ll be gone.” Rodney stood up and left the building without another word or so much as a glance backwards.

The duo was quiet as they heard the distinct splutter of a noise engine rev up and just as quickly fade into this distance.

Chris was the one to break the silence. “Well, that was—”

“So help me if you make some cringey one-liner, Chris. I’m not in the mood.” Sang Mi interrupted brusquely.

Chris tried a different tack.

“Do you reckon that man, whoever he was, had met… you know…?” he trailed off, not needing to specify the identity of the woman, as he and Sang Mi had only met her themselves not long prior.

“I guess so.” She shrugged. “A woman in a creepy black dress sure does sound like Sal. And she told that man to tell us of that ‘monster’ he met; three guesses what she’s trying to get us to do.”

“Yes, it all adds up. After we finish up here, what say we go poke our noses at the railroad?” Sang Mi grunted in agreement.

After a moment of silence and idle contemplation, Anna-Mae brought them their breakfast, balanced in her arms. She laid the plates in front of them, fixing a smile towards Chris.

“You have a really nice forehead,” Chris offered, remembering what his friend had told him and attempting to reciprocate the flirtation. He did not, however, think through what he said and it had the opposite effect that he intended; Anna-Mae’s smile dropped, replaced with a nonplussed frown. She abruptly left them to eat without another word.

* * *

They wasted no time in driving to the trestle bridge that ran over Pope Lick Creek. Chris parked their car safely down the road, a short distance down from the bridge. The bridge was next to an intersection, and on its opposite side lay a gas station. As the duo walked down to the bridge they had to avoid a couple of oncoming cars.

“You know,” Chris struck up conversation, “That guy’s description of the creature he saw reminds me of Greek mythology. You’ve heard of satyrs, right? Half-men, half-goat people?”

“Until recently I would have thought you were having me on, but now? Why does it not surprise me?” Sang Mi sighed. “So they exist, do they?”

“…and so do the Greek gods themselves. Sometimes. My employers have, uh, an understand with them. But people like them come and go, real one moment, then not a moment later.”

Sang Mi took this in her stride. Somehow a bunch of muscled men in togas commanding the elements didn’t surprise her any more than goatmen.

They had reached the trestle bridge, which contrary to the ethos of the stories told about it, was unexpectedly ordinary. The road and sidewalk were clean and well maintained, the grass well- trimmed, the foliage and trees thick and dense. The structure of the bridge itself was rusty, but not dilapidated.

“Let’s hope appearances can be deceiving, eh? ‘Cause this is anything but spooky.” Chris was obviously disappointed. “Shall we take a look around? You have a nosey at the creek while I wrestle with the bushes?”

“Can you do the creek? I actually can’t swim. Never had the opportunity to learn where I lived.”

“You know, that should have crossed my mind after our adventure with Oscar. Alright then, shall we meet back here in half an hour?”

“Sure.”

Chris took to the creek like a rabid dog. He quickly yanked off his shoes and socks, rolled up his trousers, and bounded into the flowing current. He sploshed around, arching his posture to inspect the river bed and bank. Underneath the roadbridge that formed part of the intersection, the only notable find was a bit of vulgar graffiti.

He decided to move on and made his way further upstream after grabbing his footwear, in preparation for climbing over the mass of low-laying vegetation and underwood. He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, as he used his right foot to push the growths away from the ground. Human-sized goat droppings, maybe? Evidence of weeds being nibbled at?

After spending ten or so minutes doing this without any success, even leaving the creek itself and traipsing a small distance under the shadow of the several-hundred foot long structure, let out a dry laugh, bored out of his mind. Yet, for good measure, he decided to give his method one last go, one last kick. He punted a rather snide-looking bramble, and--CLUNK! His foot collided with something.

Crouching, he inspected what he had struck: jutting out of the dried mud like some sort of ancient burial marker, was the rusted handle of a bike.

Chris grinned.

* * *

Sang Mi didn’t share her companion’s enthusiasm. Unlike him, she had little desire to hack through the thicket, to come out on the other side looking like a madman with twigs and leaves knotted in her hair. Besides, as she made her way along the raised tarmac path that went parallel to the road, she found that the far side was fenced off. Ominous ‘DANGER’ and ‘NO TRESPASSING’ signs placed by the Norfolk Southern Railway were obvious warnings to any foolhardy adventurers who found that a wire-mesh fence wasn’t enough of an indicator that hiking up the embankment and onto the bridge that loomed dizzyingly high up off the ground was a bad idea.

Instead, she set her sights on the gas station.

She darted around a pick-up truck as she crossed the car park, nearing the building. Incidentally to the supposed satyr running around these parts, the physical architecture of the Circle K vaguely reminded her of a Greek temple, as the front of the store had some six concrete pillars holding up a canopy.

Inside the store, she grabbed a coffee for herself, a cola for Chris, and a handful of snacks, as she thought that not only would they need refreshments, it would give her an excuse to strike up a conversation with the clerk.

She glanced around for any sign of local memorabilia, but with no sign of any she plonked her goods down on the counter. The clerk,—Otis, going by the nametag on his red polo shirt—greeted her and started scanning. He was a thirty-something African-American man, with a fade and a wiry beard.

“So, Otis,” she started. She saw Otis raise an eyebrow upon hearing his own name, but she didn’t falter. “I hear that a goatman lives up on the bridge over there?”

“Let me tell you the truth,” he laughed dryly. “It’s a load of old nonsense. Just tall tales made by people who are bored or who have something to sell. There’s nothing there but death—and not by the hooves of some demonic creature, but by people climbing on that bridge and paying for it with their lives.”

The tone of the conversation had turned dour.

“So it’s all made up, yeah? But, like, what are those tall tales? I’m curious.”

“I don’t know the full details, not that anyone agrees on them, but one story claims there was this Satan-worshipping farmer who became half-goat after a sacrifice gone wrong. The other main story was that the goatman was a member of a circus train who swore revenge on its captors, and for some reason decided to do that by haunting a rickety old bridge—either that or it escaped after the train derailed on the bridge.”

“Pretty inventive, huh?” Sang Mi played along. She didn’t want to come across as a loon if she started insisting that the goatman was real.

“That’ll be $12.98, including the bag. You paying with card?”

She looked at him with an empty expression. Card? she thought. Oh right, yes, money. She feigned a smile while Otis reciprocated with the blandly tired look of retail workers everywhere.

She shook her head as she dug out a couple of scrunched up bills from her back pocket, which Otis tried to flatten, with little success, before inserting them into the till. Sang Mi thanked him as she grabbed her plastic bag in one hand and her coffee in the other, left the shop, then jogged across the road back to the shadow of the bridge.

She saw Chris maniacally grinning from a mile off. “Chris, what’s that smile for?”

He explained what he found.

“There’s a guy in that gas station who wouldn’t believe you and would think you’ve gone a little looney,” she jabbed an extended thumb over her shoulder in the direction of the building.

“Probably. Anyway, I don’t think there is anything more to do here. Reckon we should come back at night? Things do go bump in the night, after all.”

Sang Mi agreed, sipping her beverage as she shook the bag at Chris. He grabbed it and began rummaging around in it delightedly, finally pulling out what he wanted and plonking himself gracelessly on the grass. There, he crossed his legs like a child and tucked in. Sang Mi stood silently, continuing to sip at the hot drink. The more she drank the brighter her mood became.

“I’m sorry, Chris,” she attempted. “I’ve been grumpy. I really am.” She rubbed her head in a vain attempt to ease her thumping headache she only now realized she had.

“Honestly Sang Mi, I hadn’t noticed,” he lied, attempting to make her feel better.

They killed the rest of the day by visiting Louisville’s amenities; they wasted an unreasonable amount of time due to Chris’s prideful refusal to ask for directions; the Louisville Slugger Museum & Factory was an enjoyable visit, even in spite of their shared ignorance of baseball; they were impressed by the veneration of the late Muhammad Ali at his eponymous museum; and they spent the rest of the day at NuLu, topping everything off with a meal at an oven-baked pizza place. They were living in the moment, basking in the wonder of life itself.

* * *

They were welcomed back to Pope Lick Creek by the hoots of an owl, perched on a tree, high up and out of sight. Chris parked the car in the same place as earlier, and while he grabbed a pair of flashlights for himself and Sang Mi, he was taken aback by what she was preparing.

“The baseball bat? Do you really think that’s necessary?”

From the baseball factory they visited earlier, Sang Mi had insisted on having a personalized bat to commemorate the visit, which had cost a small fortune. Yet Chris thought it a small price to pay for her joy over the stained, wooden-bodied club, which she had customized with a blue barrel and a short, inscribed message:

Kalingkata: The Wandering Star.

“Absolutely!” she grinned. The angle of light from Chris’s flashlight cast shadows in the recesses of her face that made her expression look more akin to that of a maniacal nutjob. He let out a laugh then tossed her the other flashlight before she remembered to ask: “Considering we’re about to trespass, do you have those wire cutters on you?”

Chris promptly dug the pair out from the trunk and brandished them in the air triumphantly.

They wasted no time in cutting through the fence and ignoring the multiple and very literal warning signs, checking over their shoulders to make sure nobody was near, climbing up the very same bank the man at the diner had described, and making it onto the railroad line. They safely crouched in the shadows for a while, telling jokes as they waited for a train to pass them. After the train thundered past, which took an annoyingly long time given its length and slow speed, Sang Mi realized that they could have just waited in the car. Chris aptly facepalmed. They got up and brushed the dirt off their trousers.

“That guy wasn’t exaggerating when he described this thing,” Sang Mi groaned as she tentatively placed a foot onto the first beam.

“Hey, it’s not that bad!” Chris made a show of confidence, walking backwards along the bridge with ease. “Just don’t look down.”

Sang Mi shot him a look but he was too oblivious to notice, caught up in the exhilaration of the height. Up here, the breeze tousled Chris’s hair majestically. Yet for Sang Mi, it seemed to unfairly whip across her face.

“Ahoy there, Goatman!” Chris called out into the void. “We’re here to talk! We’re your friends!” “CHRIS!” Sang Mi worriedly hissed at him. “Keep it down! Someone could still hear us.”

“Such as?” He heeded little for the fact that unwanted attention could actually land them in trouble with the authorities.

Instead of replying, Sang Mi merely pointed in the direction of the gas station and, as he followed the direction of her finger, he let out a deflated “Ah”.

They continued on, now in silence, hoping for any sign of anything out of the ordinary. Although they didn’t admit it to each other, they felt as if they were wasting their time. Even though they knew Sal expected them to find something, this felt to them more as if she were playing an unfunny prank and was about to appear any moment and shout “Boo!”, as nonsensical and dangerous an act like that would be right now.

It was lucky for them, for at that precise moment, the fabled goatman made an appearance. Yet, in spite of them being prepared for everything…

…they weren’t prepared for this. “Is that…?” Sang Mi started.
“What the Hell?” Chris finished.

The goatman was decidedly translucent and glowed a pale blue light. “It’s a ghost?!” Sang Mi was dumbfounded.

Chris scratched his head, entirely unsure what to do.

“He-eh-eh-eh-eh-ello?” the goatman wailed eerily. “Fri-eh-eh-eh-ends?”

“Yes, yes we are!” Chris’s instincts kicked in and his mind snapped into action. “We are your friends and we’re here to help! So what do you need help with, Mr Goatman…? Uhhh, do you have a name?”

As the spectral being neared them, Chris and Sang Mi tried to get a better look by illuminating it with their flashlights, but the light passed right through.

“If any physicists were here they’d have a field day with this.” Sang Mi grinned. “This is fascinating.”

“Frie-eh-eh-eh-end?”

Chris sighed. He had hoped that communicating with a ghost wouldn’t have been like in stories.

Still, he tried again.

“Yes, we are. I’m Chris Cwej, and this is my friend Sang Mi. And we’re your friends too.”
“Fri-eh-eh-eh-ends.” It said more assertively. It had now reached, more-or-less, the midpoint of the bridge--

—and, without warning, fell sideways into the darkness below. The duo craned their necks over, just as its unearthly illuminance disappeared. Without words, they ran back to the end of the bridge and slid down the embankment. Chris grabbed a spade from the car, Sang Mi left her baseball bat, and they made their way to where the goatman fell, marked by the rusted handle of a bike.

“We should help him pass on, shouldn’t we?” Sang Mi suggested. “Find his bones and give him a proper farewell, from friends. That should work, shouldn’t it?”

“Worth a shot!”

Sang Mi held her flashlight steady as Chris rested his on the ground and started digging around the bike, using the edge of the shovel itself to hack through the web of roots. His strength made quick work of the job; as Sang Mi hauled the bike backwards, out of Chris’s way, he started digging with his hands and placing any bones he found in a neat pile.

There weren’t many. Over the course of decades, the goatman’s corpse had likely been scavenged by wildlife, and the remnants further distributed by weather. In all, there appeared to be a few odd fingers, a femur, a few ribs and a fractured skull.

* * *

As the sun rose once again, Chris and Sang Mi had work to do.

After a quick minute of research on Google, they decided on Jefferson Memorial Forest as the perfect place to lay the goatman’s body to rest. They carried its bones in a cardboard box they plucked from the gas station as they walked deep into the forest, ascending the terrain to a high point that overlooked downtown Louisville. Chris dug a grave and lowered the remains into it.

“Sang Mi, do you want to say a few words?”

“Sure. Um, Mr. Goatman, while we didn’t really know you, you were probably really nice, and it’s awful the way you died. I’m sorry you never had friends in life, but now, you have us.” She spoke softly, yet uncertainly. The city caught her eye and she added: “And the city and the forest. You’ll have the world of humans and the world of nature buzzing around you, forever, and you can become one with the Earth itself.”

“That was lovely,” Chris smiled with great sincerity.

“I wasn’t that good. I just said the first thing that came to mind. I keep thinking I should just say a prayer—I just didn’t know if that would be…” She trailed off, and repeated a muttered: “It wasn’t that good.”

“You are that good,” Chris insisted. “Now, we’ve someone to visit.”

* * *

Rodney had just finished his meal of ham and eggs on toast and was heading back to his rusty, beaten truck. To his horror he noticed a car pull up with those two strangers from the day before and he rushed into his truck. They ran over, shouting hello, and began knocking on his window. He was just about to tell them to leave him alone when he noticed what the girl was holding.

No.

It couldn’t be.

It was his bike. It was mangled, bent, rusted, muddy, and overall just scrap at this point, but it was his bike!

He slowly got out and fell to his knees, in complete shock. “W-where did you find it?” he stammered.

“Pretty much exactly where you said it was,” blond man told him. “Same with the goatman.” Rodney looked up at the man, his eyes filled with fright.

“Yes, that goatman. It never meant you any harm, you know. But we found it, or what was left of it, and gave it a proper farewell.” The man smiled reassuringly.

“And I think that’ll be the last people see of the goatman. It can be at peace and people won’t have a reason to risk their lives trying to find it.” The girl added.

Rodney was at a loss for words. He shook the hands of the pair and got back in his truck after putting his bike in the truck bed, and drove off.

He took in the rays of the summer sun, feeling the warm rays dance on his skin.

He felt renewed. The incident in his past, that had eaten so thoroughly at his mind for countless years, was now not so bad. He was feeling so much better, anticipatory of what the world could offer him. That night was far behind him.

And now?

A new lease of life lay ahead.

She’d literally been in a car crash, and fought a giant vampire with sword in hand, but no; this was the thing that had her so scared her legs were trembling. This. Her mom would be laughing at her.

“Oh, come on, just get on the boat.”

She shook her head, rapidly. “No thank you. I mean, people used to go on boats, but Blackbeard was a pirate then!”

Chris sighed. “People used boats long after Blackbeard died.”

“Not on Gongen!”

“What, are there no oceans or lakes on Gongen—oh.” Suddenly Chris got it, and his demeanor softened. “You really haven’t been on a boat before, have you? Sorry, I don’t know, I just sort of assumed.”

She squinted. “Is it safe, like, you can’t see the bottom of the water, and what if I fall off?”

“You can just swim to shore!” Chris said cheerily. Then the next thought hit him. “You uh, can swim right?”

She shook her head rapidly a second time.

“Oh. Really? They don’t teach you that at school?”

“Where do you think my family would go to swim? The desert? Do you know how expensive a swimming pool is on a desert planet?”

“There’s an artificial beach, right? Don’t you take school trips there?”

She held a look at him.

“Right, okay. Well with the life vest, you’ll float on top of the water if you fall off, and it’s a sturdy boat! I inspected it myself.” He sighed. “Wish I could have grabbed the Vicinity II.”

She put a foot out, and touched it on the hull of the boat.

It jiggled slightly and she immediately pulled back. “I’m telling you Chris, this amount of water is not normal. Humans were not meant to be on boats; they should be in their natural habitats—big glass domes.”

Chris looked over the side of the boat and watched the fishes swimming around below them.” If you get in the boat you can pick dinner tonight, anything you want.” He turned his eyes back to her; she was clearly chewing on that.

“…Even cheonggukjang jjigae?”

He would simply have to accept this loss. “Even cheonggukjang jjigae.” He didn’t quite hide his dreariness at the idea, or his queasiness just thinking of its pungent aroma, but his willingness to go that far despite all that seemed to sell her on getting past her own discomfort. She reached her foot out, pulled it back. Reached out, pulled back, and then finally set it in the boat, which wobbled, and caused her to wobble too.

She yelped as she lost her balance, and Chris was quick to catch her, helping her down onto the seat on the rowboat. She clutched the sides of the boat cautiously and looked over the edge into the water. “And you’re sure it’s safe?”

He unmoored the boat and pushed off. “We’ll be fine.”

They started rowing. Chris felt his worries slide away, the calming waters and the gentle sunlight letting him feel a peace he hadn’t felt in ages, while Sang Mi repeatedly grabbed a hold of things, and whispered a long prayer apologizing for everything she had done wrong in the last few months.

Eventually, she calmed down (a bit) and while still tense, was able to look around. “So… The Beast of Busco? From the picture in the book, it just looks like a big turtle.”

“That’s ‘cause it’s a big turtle.”

Sang Mi nodded slowly, then caught herself on the side of the boat again. “I know we’re looking for aliens and cryptids and mysteries, but what if it’s like… just a big turtle?”

Chris shrugged. “What’s the biggest turtle you’ve ever seen?”

“…Size of a pie plate at the pet shop.”

“This would be a lot bigger, so at the very least, we’ll be seeing something new.”

“Honestly, this is something new enough. I never thought I’d be on a boat.”

His smile was as gentle as the sunlight. “So not so bad?”

“No so bad,” she agreed.

The sun got lower, until it was a golden-orange crest on the horizon. At that point, Sang Mi had actually gotten calm, and had gotten comfortable enough she was letting her fingertips trace the water’s surface.

That was when they saw it.

At first, it was a small stream of bubbles. Then the water rippled, and then a head poked out of the water, along with the top of a huge shell. It was indeed a very large snapping turtle. Though perhaps not exactly one, its features were a little more… prehistoric, perhaps?

Sang Mi looked over at Chris, her face glowing with an open-mouthed smile. He returned it. It was indeed wonderful. Neither spoke, for fear of disturbing it. It was good enough just to see it. It lifted its jaw up and sniffed the air.

Then the noise came.

The pair looked over—coming towards the lake was a black helicopter. Sang Mi pulled up her binoculars, and tried to focus in the dusk.

“…E… D.E.M. Oh damn it—Chris, it’s those guys who did the child kidnapping in Violethill?”

Cursing, Chris stood up, unbalancing the boat and causing Sang Mi to curl up clutching the bench, waving his arms and yelling: “Go back under water! Shoo! Shoo!”

He pulled a pair of sunglasses out of his pocket, and hurled them into the water with a plop, “SHOO!”

The Beast was spooked, and went under the water, and they both deflated in relief. Which was short lived, as things began to drop out of the helicopter into the water.

Things that exploded.

They hit the surface with a splash, then sank for just long enough it seemed like nothing would happen. But then huge bursts came up in columns as they exploded under the surface, sending waves out in all directions. The boat rolled and Sang Mi yelped as she was thrown overboard. Chris held on, but this wasn’t as useful as he hoped as the boat kept rolling and capsized, his head bobbing up above the water into the overturned hull.

He took a deep breath, and swam down and out from under the boat, rising to the surface. He scanned the water, seeing Sang Mi floating safely (if panicked) in her life-vest, and on the shore a group of black SUVs and a huge flatbed truck. The SUVs were pulling on metal cords that sank into the water, which quickly turned into a net holding a huge snapping turtle, crying out in pain. It thrashed against the net, trying to break free, bellowing to the sky as armed E.D.E.M agents shot it over and over with tranquilizers, the SUVs dragging it up the ramp on to the truck as it screamed.
“We have to help it!” Sang Mi yelled, trying to figure out how to swim towards it in real time.

Chris gritted his teeth. “We will. I promise.”

* * *

Getting to shore was difficult, but worse: it was time-consuming. By the time they’d reached land, they were both exhausted, soaked, and their targets had long since driven away. If time weren’t an issue, they’d have stopped for the evening right then and there. But instead, they changed into new clothes quickly in the Honda, and Chris gave Sang Mi an important job.

“You’re still good with computers, right? You can still do hacking and—” he waggled his fingers over her laptop, “—fancy tech stuff?”

She nodded. “I mean, I didn’t lose the ability. The operating systems are different here, but that doesn’t stop me from using my ultimate skill.”

Chris furrowed his brow. “Okay. Cause we need to find where they took Oscar.”

“Oscar?”

“The local nickname for the creature.”

She nodded, and instead of opening her laptop pulled her phone out, searched for a few things, then pulled up a phone number, and called.

“Hello, Mr. Johnson? Haha, yes. This is Grace from tech support, it looks like we’ve seen some unusual activity from your account. I’d like to take a look if you don’t mind. It’s nice to talk to someone with such a strong voice on these calls, it’s really—oh you run marathons? I might have guessed you were muscular. Could I get your num—I mean your password, haha, so I can check the issue on my end?”

She said it all with a completely emotionless expression. 

“Well, I guess that’s hacking,” Chris mumbled.

* * *

They followed the address Sang Mi had gotten, and as she read internal emails from E.D.E.M out loud, they were both intrigued by the idea that there was a secret meeting taking place where they were going to, and also annoyed at the sheer ineptitude of the people writing the emails.

“A lot of these read like a guy who won’t leave you alone after you told him to go away,” Sang Mi said.

“Yeah, that’s their target recruitment demographic,” Cwej said unironically.

“I sort of assumed they’d be like… smarter? Is that rude? Elitist?”

Chris shook his head as he squeaked a tight turn. “Nah. You just feel like bad guys should have an evil plan that makes sense. I get that. It’s nice to believe, that there’s some sort of hidden meaning to it all. But a lot of the time, bad guys aren’t motivated by brilliance. They’re boring bullies who just like being bullies.”

Sang Mi frowned, and looked out the window at the darkening sky. “That’s disappointing.”

“Say more.”

“It… makes the world feel hollow?”

Chris took one hand off the wheel and put it on her shoulder, which he was clearly surprised he had done and caused the car to do a little squiggle on the road. “Someone else’s life feeling hollow doesn’t mean yours is.”

She smiled, and then looked down at her phone. “Thanks Ch—WAIT TURN RIGHT.”

* * *

They drove past their destination, and parked in a field behind some trees. They had seen what it was, and while they had been prepared for most things, they had assumed they had been prepared for anything, but they had not in fact been prepared for ‘generic Italian restaurant’. They trudged through the underbrush, and poked their heads out, Sang Mi using her binoculars to read out the ’restaurant closed for special event’ sign.

“I can see some of the guests going in. Maybe my phone can recognize them?” She awkwardly zoomed in and snapped a picture. “Maurice Gibbons, owner of… child sweatshops in three countries? What the heck?”

Chris rubbed his nose. “Well, if this is what it looks like, and they’re taking Oscar into a restaurant kitchen…”

Sang Mi felt her whole body go cold. “We have to rescue him!”

“We will. I promise. Who else do you see?”

She snapped another picture, and waited a moment. “Search says… Janette Coolidge. Escaped conviction for poisoning two-thousand of her workers through unsafe practices that resulted in cancer … are all of them like this?”

“Yeah,” Chris said. “That’s the clientele here. Beasts, all of them.”

Sang Mi nodded. “So how do we want to play this, I mean we can’t just walk in?”

“Oh, we can just walk in, just not through the front. There was a convenience store down the road, right?”

Sang Mi’s eyes lit up. “Oh, I get you.”

* * *

Manuel wiped his hands off and went to the back door where the knocking had not let up. He swung it open. “Yeah?”

There was a tall white man and an Asian teenage girl there, each carrying cases of cheap Seven Veils Beer stacked on each other.

“Where should we put it?” asked the man.

“We weren’t expecting any delivery?”

The man sighed. “Look I can show you the order on my phone, it’s not my problem what you do with it.”

Manuel hesitated, and then heard Mr. Mitchell yell for him to get back to prepping the salads. Whatever, he wasn’t being paid enough to figure this out. “Whatever, look, just uh, put ‘em in the storage room, it’s down the hall to the left, says storage room on the door.”

“Right, got it,” he put his foot in the door to keep it open. “Come on then,” he said to the girl, who shuffled along behind him.

Manuel went back to the kitchen, and got back to salad prep, trying to ignore the giant turtle in the middle of the room. Nina nudged him. “Hey, uh, do you know what’s up with the turtle? They’re not usually that big, right?”

The turtle looked at them through the cage, the muzzle around its mouth straining for a moment as if it wanted to answer.

“Just ignore it, that’s part of the job.”

“What if it’s like, endangered? Won’t we get in trouble?”

He went over and grabbed another bag of lettuce, “We’re already in trouble or we wouldn’t be working here.”

“But—”

“HEY,” the other white man, the balding one in the tuxedo at the back, yelled from his folding chair. “Could you keep it down, I’m trying to get ready back here.”

They shut up and worked in silence.

“God, seven billionaires in the audience and they can’t even give me a goddamn green room…”

He leaned back, shaking his head.

“Hey, sweet cheeks, yeah, you, by the ugly guy. Why don’t you come back here and gimme a kiss?”

Nina ignored him.

“I’m talking to you sweetheart. I was on the billboard charts, you know.” He patted his lap. “Come on, take a break.”

Nina’s lip was trembling. Manuel tried to decide what he should do. How bad did he want this job? He knew that hesitating here made him a coward. But he’d been through worse.

“HEY. You can’t talk to her that way!” the girl who’d come in earlier said, storming up to Mr. Tuxedo.

He stood up. “Who the hell are you?”

She poked him in the chest. “I’m the person telling you to leave her alone.”

He scowled. “I’m getting Gerry—you’re all going to be fired; you don’t get to disrespect me like this.” He threw his arms out. “I was on the Billboard charts! Who do you think you are!?”

“You can’t talk to her that way!” the blond man said as he stormed out from the back.”

“People keep saying that but I sure can, I can say whatever I want.”

“I have no idea who you are,” the girl said, blandly.

He moved to shove her, and the blond man instinctively clocked him in the jaw. He tumbled over and hit the tiled floor.

All work stopped. All eyes turned to the scene.

“Uhhh,” the girl said.

Manuel rushed to the man, checking his pulse. He was out cold, but he’d be fine. He looked up at the pair of interlopers from where he was squatted over the now unconscious MC. “What the hell are we supposed to do, he’s supposed to go out there in five minutes introducing the main dish.” He pointed at the turtle.

“There’s Oscar!” the girl said. “Well, that’s a mystery solved.”

“Main dish isn’t good,” the blond man mumbled.

Manuel looked around, “Anyone ever been on stage? Know how to sing?”

The girl looked at the man, who shrugged, and she turned back to him unsure. “I’ve done standup comedy—oh, and I was in a TV show once, but that’s…”

“Good enough. Nina, get her into one of the tuxes in the back.”

“But—” the girl and man said in unison.

“NO BUTS, you’re on as soon as you’re dressed.” He picked the script up off the floor and shoved it into her hands. “Get reading.”

* * *

Sang Mi stumbled out, then forced herself into a faux-confident stride. The tux didn’t fit, but it had been pinned so that it looked like it was hand tailored. That didn’t make it comfortable. She’d barely had time to look at the script, so she’d be winging most of this.

She looked at Oscar, who looked back at her with what she was probably projecting was a sad hope.

“Don’t worry lil guy, we’ll get you out of here,” she whispered to him, before raising her microphone, and as the band started to play strode up to the microphone smiling and waving like she was supposed to be there.

“How are we doing tonight?” There was applause. People always applauded when you asked that, like clapping was words. “Wonderful, wonderful. Great to be here in beautiful Churubusco Indiana. Uh,” she pulled the microphone off the stand, and wandered around the front, gesturing finally at a group of men at a table. “And where are you folks visiting from this evening?”

“Florida!” one yelled.

“Idaho!” another chimed in.

“I’m from here…” a third said meekly.

She shrugged. “Wow, travelled a long way.” That got a laugh, somehow. “So, what do you boys do?”

“We’re uh, E.D.E.M agents,” one said.

“Well, I knew that,” she said, as convincingly as she could manage under the circumstances. “Have any hobbies?”

“Uhhh…”

She moved on. “And I hear we have some very special guests this evening!” She scanned the room looking for the people who thought they were special. “Ah, there we go, round of applause please! We’re so honored you’re here!” Whoever you are!

A man and woman, the man with the air of a politician, stood up and waved, and a group of other men at a table stood but didn’t wave and looked a little more awkward about the whole thing.

“Lovely, lovely. I’m your host tonight, Sang Mi Jhe. You might know me from uh… stuff.” She was running out of steam and so was relieved when a voice came in over the intercom. “Everyone rise for the singing of the national anthem.”

“Oh, thank god,” she mumbled, and started right in.

“Glory to Gongen, you shall live forever
your people who love you will stand by your side
to live and to serve you, to fight and defend you,
through war and through peace we will stand tall with pride!
Forever live Shocho!
Long live the Gongen people!
We’ll beat the Earthers back once and for all
From Phobos to Deimos shining bright
to Olympus Mons at its proud height
Gongen forever, we fight for you!”

Everyone expected her to stop, like it was a gag, but she was getting really into it and barreled right into the next verse.

* * *

They shoved Sang Mi out on stage, and as soon as he’d waved her off and given her a double thumbs up as she and Oscar, now laying tied to a giant silver platter, disappeared past the curtain, Chris pushed past the staff, opening door after door.

“Hey, you can’t do that!” Manuel said, tailing him.

He shoved another door open. “Looks like I can.”

“No, you don’t understand—”

He tried the next door. It didn’t open. “Ah, there we go. That’s what I’m looking for.” He squatted down and inspected the lock. “You know, normally I’d just break this, but my friend there taught me a special technique, an original from the hacker Kalingkata.” He winked, and reached into his pocket and pulled out… a screwdriver.

He then proceeded to unscrew the lock mechanism from the door.

Manuel was so surprised he just stood there, blinking away.

The door opened up, and from rows of cages and tanks, animals looked up at them—strange herd animals the color of red sand called Morning Star Cows—a singular detached llama foot that nonetheless turned to face them—blue animals called caffalumps, with too many legs, looking something like a camel mixed with an elephant—a singular timefish in a tank—a two-headed purple lizard with gills—even a beautiful half-humanoid being with long brown hair, wearing a sports-bra; its bottom half was made of a serpent’s tail and… a lot of dog heads?

Then from the back, a woman called in a faintly French accent from where she was hanging upside down from the ceiling. “Hello there, might I bother you for a rescue? The blood is going to my head.”

* * *

There was faint confused applause after Sang Mi finished the entire Gongen National Anthem.

A voice came over the intercom. “And now for uh… the actual national anthem?”

Sang Mi mumbled a curse and pulled her phone out. She’d have to wing this one.

To her credit, she hit most of the notes.

* * *

Chris rushed forward, and cut the woman down, then got to work severing her bonds. The half-woman half-monster creature watched closely from the cage next to them.
Rubbing her wrists and ankles, the tied-up woman gave him a smile. “Thanks, who knew this one would go so sideways. You’re Cwej, right? I recognize the face from my training.”

He startled, “You do?”

With her hands now free, she pulled a badge from within her bosom. “Odette Caron, from C.R.O.I.X.—that is, C.R.U.X., in English.”

It was such a bizarre occurrence he really had no reason to doubt it. “And why is someone from a French research institute studying alien lifeforms operating in Indiana?”

She gestured at the animals, and the glowering half-woman. “We can’t have private individuals destroying live specimens just for their own, sick amusement. It’s immoral and it’s un-scientific. Besides, this is against international law—and interplanetary law as far as we know it. Aliens have threatened to wipe Earth out for less than this.”

Well, she wasn’t wrong. “So, are they really… eating all these creatures?”

She nodded, disgust washing over her face. “It’s barbarism, plain and simple. And E.D.E.M is running it, so no one stops them. When they decided they were going to eat Scylla, no one questioned whether we had to step in.”

Chris looked over at the cage. The half dog-serpent woman waved, menacingly.

“… The man-eating creature from the Odyssey? The one that attacked Odysseus and his men?”

“The very same,” Scylla said.

“Ah,” Chris concluded lamely.

A voice called out from the doorway: “Monsters and aliens don’t have rights, and we can eat them if we want to.” He was a surprisingly young man for the authority he clearly carried, with an aura of haughtiness that seemed to radiate out from him, his hair in a lazy buzzcut, his suit expensive but badly tailored. Behind him stood a pair of armed guards in full tactical gear.

Odette’s scowl deepened. “May I introduce Mark Ronaldson, the head of E.D.E.M.”

“DIRECTOR Mark Ronaldson!!!” he screamed back, stomping his foot. “The President gave me a title! It’s my title! I’m important! Use it!” He pulled out his own gun, with its safety.

Chris tried to put on his most diplomatic tone, holding up one hand peacefully.

“Okay, no one has to die here, we can talk—”

“Shut up!” Director Ronaldson screamed back. “None of you are walking out of here alive!”

Chris sighed. He had wanted to end this in a way that he could brag to Charles about later, but well, necessity called. He pulled out the screwdriver. “No need for introductions. You should really buy better doors, these things really are embarrassingly cheap,” he sighed again, as he unscrewed the lock mechanism from the cage door. “Not that you’ll probably get a chance to use that advice.”

Scylla pushed the door open, and gave an ear shattering scream as she launched herself at Mark Ronaldson, who didn’t need his introduction anymore as various bits of him splattered the wall. Odette quickly began opening the other cages—the caffalumps reared on their legs out of their cages and charged the wall. The sound of machine-gun fire briefly occurred, only to be silenced with the wet sound of meat being ripped by teeth.

Chris and Odette shared a look of relief, and then a terrible thought struck Chris: Sang Mi was still on-stage.

* * *

“The Beast of Busco, what a wonderful creature. Sure would be a shame to eat it huh?” The audience looked back at her awkwardly. “Wow, tough crowd!” she said; a desperate attempt to recover that worked better than she expected as some people actually laughed. “We’re uh, waiting for our special guest to return before we send Oscar here back to the kitchen—”

“JUST GET ON WITH IT!” the senator called from the back. “They have to butcher and cook the damn thing, he’ll be back by then.”

The sound of screams and machine gun fire echoed from the back.

“…All part of the show folks, all part of the show…” She edged back over to Oscar, and began to hastily start pulling off his restraints and muzzle.

People began to rise from their seats, some beelining for the exit, some coming up towards the stage asking what was going on, to see a manager, or saying she’d never work in this town again, etc. Guards, some in suits, some in tactical gear, also were rushing forward.

She ignored them, and focused on getting Oscar free. The last restraint came loose, and he gave a great bellow of freedom, as through the curtains a half-woman, half-serpent-and-dogs person came barreling through. Hugging Oscar’s side, she gave the monster-woman a thumbs up, and Oscar leaned into her protectively.

The woman seemed to accept this, and moved on quickly—leaping from the stage into the audience, her many dog heads biting, her tail lashing, her eyes filled with rage.

The guards lined up by the left wall raised their guns, only for the wall to collapse on top of them as great blue beasts charged in, stomping their way through the crowd. A strange, eyeless fish leapt from the gap; a woman caught hold of its tail, only to turn into a baby, and then an old woman, and finally a skeleton. Something that looked like a llama foot flew out and went for a man’s jugular. Still more creatures followed. 

But Sang Mi had stopped looking, and focused on guiding Oscar off stage. “We uh… well, don’t worry about all that, big guy. Let’s get you home.”

He gave an affirmative bass noise.

As they pushed through the curtains, through the small backstage, and back into the kitchen, she saw a relieved Chris who was already running towards her.

“We’re okay!” she said. “Granted, a lot of people are not okay, but me and Oscar are!”

“That’s all that matters,” Chris said. Then paused. “Don’t tell Charles I said that.”

Sang Mi gave a thumbs up, and they both looked at Odette. “Who is she?”

“Odette Caron. She’s like… from the French SIGNET, if that makes sense.”

“Sorta,” Sang Mi replied.

“Hello there! And don’t worry, I’m perfectly fine with letting Scylla do her thing,” Odette said, mimicking Sang Mi’s thumbs up.

Chris awkwardly also gave a thumbs up, all three of them in the same pose as they stood in silence while horrific noises came from the room beyond.

“E-excuse me,” Manuel said, poking his head out from where the kitchen staff had apparently been hiding behind an overturned steel table. “Are we, uh…”

“On the menu? Nah,” Chris tried to casually wave the concerns out of the air.

“What should we do, the owner was out there in the crowd…”

Odette smiled, which was a little awkward with the background noise. “Don’t worry, we’ll get things cleaned up, you won’t have anything pinned on you. Oh, they’re probably worried about their jobs!”

“Are they?” Sang Mi asked quietly.

“We’ll make sure one of you gets the deed transferred to you. Any volunteers?”

Manuel bit his lip for a moment. “It should be Nina.”

Everyone else seemed to agree with that.

“Great! Well once things get settled down, we’ll iron this all out.”

Chris and Sang Mi raised their thumbs up again, and everyone settled in.
 
* * *

“E.D.E.M is getting an entirely new leadership, as it appears the director and every department head have resigned to spend more time with their families. None of them could be reached for comment, despite repeated attempts by our reporting staff. Concerns that this new leadership were even less experienced than the last set were quashed by officials, who said everything is fine and to not ask questions. Senator Griffith described their resignation as a tragedy, but refused to explain why his arm was in a cast, nor why spending more time with their families was tragic.

“In other news, the return of missing students in Violetthill Illinois—”

Manuel turned the radio off. “Enough of that. Who is on the grill?”

“Sorry!” Maria rushed back over to it.

He shook his head. “We have to get things ready for the investor today, Nina won’t like it if—”

“Oh, you don’t need to worry about that, your funding is secure.” All eyes turned to the woman speaking, who had entered in through the back. He thought they’d fixed the locks; oh well. She was dressed head to toe in black, with a veil covering her face. In one hand she held a gold birdcage that was covered by a burgundy cloth. She was flanked by a pair of bodyguards in suits and sunglasses. She extended a hand, “Sal H., your new investor.”

He shook it. “A pleasure, if you’ll—”

“Like I said, your funding is secure. On the condition you tell me all about the visit Chris Cwej and Sang Mi paid here. I have a lot of questions.”

He swallowed—something about her gave him the creeps. But he’d do it for Nina.

 * * *

The three of them, Odette, Sang Mi, and Chris, sat in the rowboat watching Oscar paddle around.

“A beautiful creature. You did a good thing rescuing him—and rescuing me, for the record,” Odette said. “Why are you here, anyway; you didn’t seem to know I’d be here?”

“Oh, we’re…” Chris fumbled around for a moment, and then decided being honest was better than the awkward silence. “We’re going to an auction. It’s in the Blue Ridge Mountains.”

Odette’s eyes lit up. “Ah, we at the Conservatoire have heard of it. It’s famous, and exclusive. You’re lucky to attend.”

Sang Mi looked down into the water, her face solemn. “Isn’t it kind of odd? We get a letter from Salome, she sends us on a road trip, and we start running into creatures and monsters and people from organizations with acronyms for names? And we even ran into someone from the Odyssey after we named our car that! Isn’t that all just… too co-incidental?”

Chris had considered this, but had written it off as needless worry. “We’re just trying to spend as much time together as we can before I have to send you back. I don’t think there’s anything more to all this.”

Sang Mi nodded, but he could tell she didn’t believe him.

“Oh, look!” Odette called. He turned to see Oscar diving under the water, and then leaping out from it, high into the air in a joyous burst, before splashing back down.

“Well, whatever, even if it was messy we saved the day,” Sang Mi said.

“Sure did,” Chris replied. And he meant it.
​
They stayed there till the sun set, and then parted ways with Odette. The road awaited them, and who knew what they’d see next. 

Chris Cwej was getting wary of rest stops.
​
He and Sang Mi had been on the road for days now, covering the same stretch of land, over and over. At least, that’s what it felt like—there was no variety, nothing to mark the miles save an ever-increasing milometer and a litany of Are we nearly there yets. Even the rest stops looked the same—after days on end of such monotony, Cwej was desperate for even the slightest hint at something new. Rest stops were meant to break from the boredom, but alas, even they were all identical. Really rather the opposite of what they were supposed to be—Cwej found that made them hard to trust.

Sliding back into the car—a 2007 Honda Element that gave new meaning to the term ‘rundown’—he turned to his travelling companion, Sang Mi.

“Hey, come on, are you sure you don’t want to stretch your legs before we set off again? I don’t know how long it’ll be before we get another chance.”

Sang Mi shrugged. She was staring out the window, which felt sad, because even if there wasn’t much else to do on this kind of road trip, not even trying to pretend otherwise somehow made it worse. Cwej slapped his hands down on the driver’s seat, making her jump.

“Come on! Earth to Sang Mi!”

“Huh? Oh, no, it’s fine. Let’s just get going.”

Cwej sighed, then glanced back at the rest stop. “The little shop has candy.”

“Oh-okay-I-guess-I’ll-stretch-my-legs-for-just-a-minute-if-you-insist!” Sang Mi’s quick string of words bounded out of her mouth faster than Cwej could follow. By the time he worked out what she’d said, she was already entering the shop. 

It didn’t take the pair long to grab some snacks, Sang Mi already munching down on some chocolate by the time they reached the register. A bored twenty-something with spiky neon green hair stood behind the till, watching as Cwej fumbled around for his wallet inside his bag. They sighed as he began shaking out the bag’s contents, tipping out various odds and ends all over the counter, mumbling all the while about his wallet “Being in here somewhere”. Sang Mi continued to eat her chocolate.

“Look, I need some form of payment—cash, card, either is fine. Though we don’t take amex,” the cashier told him as he shook a metal sphere out of the bag. Defying all known laws of physics, it stubbornly bounced on the counter, and then right over the side, disappearing into thin air. The cashier didn’t raise an eyebrow. They worked at a gas station shop in the middle of nowhere—it was hardly the most unusual thing they’d seen in the last few days. At least this one wasn’t trying to bring a crocodile into the store. “You can pay with your phone, if that’s easier.”

“Aha!” Cwej exclaimed, and triumphantly presented a blackberry. He held it out towards the cashier, then frowned, looking down at the phone. “Uh, how exactly do I do that?”

“They mean a smartphone,” Sang Mi supplied, and Cwej swore before sliding the phone back into his pocket.

“Right, right… Look, okay, I’m really sorry, but, I think I’ve lost my wallet.” He stood there, panicking, as if he didn’t face deadly danger on a daily basis and losing his wallet really was the end of the world. The cashier sighed again.

“Look, usually I’d just say to put everything back, but, your friend there has already eaten several items,” Sang Mi was indeed breaking into a fruit-and-nuts snack pack as they spoke, “so, I don’t really know what to do. I’m probably supposed to call the cops —” Sang Mi dropped her snack pack. “—but you both seem innocent enough, and… I’m not a snitch. Look, no one else has come in all day—I’ll let you take the snacks, say they got lost, if you just make my day a bit more interesting.”

Sang Mi, who had picked up her snack pack and moved to help Cwej with his attempts to cram everything back into his bag. “How?”

The cashier shrugged. “Up to you. I’m just really bored of everything being the same, day in, day out. Maybe you can change that, even if it’s just for a few minutes.”

Cwej smiled. “I know how you feel.” He glanced down at the piece of paper he had been trying to fit in his bag, and then handed it to the cashier. He squinted to read their nametag. “Okay then, Lance, how about a story? I’m Chris Cwej, and this is my friend, Sang Mi. For the last couple weeks, I’ve been her teacher at a high school in Illinois. We saw a lot of strange things at that high school, but perhaps nothing as strange as what we uncovered during her final theater project…”

​* * *

​Junior theater club end of spring semester final project. Task: create your own short film. Students: Megan Grabowski, Sarah Jhe, Martha Sandalwood. Assessor: Mr. Cwej.
Of all the local legends that the students of Hughes High have grown up with, none is more intriguing than the tale of Francis Bilge, our very own school founder. Very little is known about the man, his reclusive nature and desire for privacy becoming not only legendary, but infectious—each of his predecessors follow in his footsteps, anonymising themselves until they disappear entirely. Our own headmistress, Ms. Suenne, remains unseen, not even having a photograph on our school brochure! So, we chose to explore this mystery in our film, “The Search for Francis Bilge”, as it is one that is close to our hearts, and has an effect on our lives to this day.

​With Martha as our camerawoman, Sarah taking the lead on research, and Megan on production, we worked together to create a short documentary about three schoolgirls’ attempts to locate that great figure of mystery—the man who created their school. We used a Canon EOS DSLR camera, Adobe for editing, and our school library, council records, teachers’ memories, and other sources for our information, as detailed in the attached ’sources’ doc. The raw footage and the final video are on the USB stick in the attached envelope.

Although our group had differing opinions on how best to present the story, we were able to overcome these through discussion, and compromised by including elements of each of our ideas. For example, Martha wanted to focus on the terror of someone who had such a lasting impact going missing so completely, so we started the documentary with a voiceover similar in tone to a ‘true crime’ report. Sarah wanted to get to the truth of what really happened to Bilge, rather than focusing on the impact, so she played the part of investigator and led the audience through the research we were doing around the mystery. Megan was more concerned about the pacing, so we made sure to include action shots at appropriate moments.

Creating this short film has taught us about teamwork, camerawork, and the effort that goes into making a film. 

What Went Well: We were able to balance everyone’s ideas fairly through frequent discussions.

Even Better If: Next time, we would spend longer in the editing stage, to make sure that our final product is fully cohesive in tone.

We hope you enjoy our exploration of the greatest mystery our school has ever known.

‘ ‘ ‘ click play to continue’ ’ ’
 
Fading in from black, a black-and-white shot of the school door, which slowly pans out to show the rest of the school as MARTHA begins speaking.
 
MARTHA (VOICEOVER)
In 1964, a man named Francis Bilge opened the doors of his home on Darmire Road, Violethill, to the children of the local area. His former students claim that he had some prior teaching experience, though we could find no records of this held in the council archives. In fact, there are no records of anything to do with the man… It’s almost as if he has been erased…
 
The video takes on color, the sounds of traffic becoming louder. A very modern-looking car zooms past the school, and MEGAN, a brown-haired girl about seventeen years old, walks into frame, followed by SARAH, a girl with short black hair around the same age. They stop in the middle, and MEGAN stares into the camera.
 
MEGAN
Here we stand today, students of what was once Bilge’s school, and we barely know a thing about him, including why he stepped down as headmaster, or what became of him after leaving Hughes High. Journey with us today as we try to uncover the truth behind Francis Bilge’s disappearance.
 
The camera shakes slightly as its holder, MARTHA, nods at MEGAN, who then spreads her arms wide before the school. SARAH takes a step forward, and the camera zooms in on her face --
 
SARAH
Whatever that may be.
 
Fade to black, then to a porch door, on which SARAH knocks. Cut to --
 
OLD WOMAN
He was a good teacher, all things considered. A bit gruff, but, very memorable. Had all sorts of little tricks to help us learn.
 
A banner appears at the bottom of the screen: MIRIAM, seventy, former student of Francis Bilge.
 
SARAH (OFF-SCREEN)
And, did you ever notice anything strange about him?
 
MIRIAM
Well, he kept to himself, that’s for sure. Never knew a thing about him. Though, there was one thing…
 
The image stills, and SARAH’s voice can be heard.
 
SARAH
We talked to several of Bilge’s students, and they all said similar things about his teaching style, personality, and one other thing…
 
We see different people, all in their seventies or older, with their names and the note that they were former students of Bilge’s appearing on banners as they spoke.
 
GEORGE
He was my first teacher. Because of his lessons, I was able to get into a proper high school.
 
LOUIS
Even though I was a weird kid, didn’t exactly fit into the norms, he never made me feel like an outsider. That was something I didn’t get from many other teachers.
 
KELLY
It was harder for girls back then in areas like this to get a proper education. He didn’t just teach me the basics—he taught proper algebra, history with real sources, the works. I’d never have been able to go to university if it weren’t for him. Not that he was there to support me through, by that time…
 
MIRIAM
Something I’ll always remember…
 
GEORGE
But, there was that one thing…
 
LOUIS
The thing none of us really brought up, even though we all knew it…
 
KELLY
I always wondered if he ever worked things out with that man.
 
SARAH (OFF-SCREEN)
What do you mean? What man?
 
KELLY
Well, there was this man who we’d sometimes see around his house, or talking to him in the garden. Well-dressed fellow.
 
GEORGE
I saw them together a lot.
 
LOUIS
They seemed real close, if you know what I mean… Though, I think they fought a lot. I could often hear them when I stopped by to deliver homework, arguing, all hushed and quiet, even when there was no-one else there. I always did wonder, you know, if we were outsiders in the same way. Their relationship certainly seemed… well…
 
GEORGE
Definitely a homo. Him and that other bloke.
 
SARAH
Do you know where we could find that other man now?
 
MIRIAM
Of course! He was on the local council at the time, half the town knew him—a Harry something. Harold Marsh, maybe? Something like that. The town hall’s probably got a picture of him, stuffed in one of those dreary offices, or at least some information about him, locked in a filing cabinet somewhere. I’m sure they’ll tell you all about him if you ask. Good luck, dearies—and, do tell Francis I asked after him if you find him, won’t you? I don’t know where I’d be without his lessons.
 
The camera zooms out to show several diplomas hanging behind Miriam’s head, as well as an educator’s license.
 
SARAH
Of course we will.
 
MEGAN and SARAH walk along a residential street.
 
MEGAN
Of course, the odds of finding Francis Bilge after all this time seem slim, but we’re determined to give it a go. Armed with our first real lead, we’re heading to the archives at City Hall for any information about our first headmaster’s alleged paramour.
 
Cut to: City Hall—it’s an ugly yellow building with modern grey automatic doors. MEGAN tries to push one of them, then looks embarrassed while she waits for it to open before confidently striding through. Inside --
 
MEGAN
Here we are, City Hall, home to records of death, birth, marriage, arrests, and so much more. We have already gone through the publicly available parts of the archives, looking for anything to do with Francis Bilge --
 
Cut to: SARAH, knelt by a low table, furiously flipping through piles and piles of paper. Images of increasing mounds of records piling up around her are superimposed onto one another, the old one fading out just as yet another stack of papers appears by her head. Dramatic classical music builds, and, at the crescendo—cuts back to City Hall, no music.
 
MEGAN
But, we were unsuccessful.
 
SARAH
However, last time, we were only looking for mentions of Bilge. Now, we have a new name to try.
 
Messy footage with intense background fuzz. SARAH’s question can barely be made out as she speaks to the figure behind the desk—a purple-haired lanky person with a name-badge pinned to their button-down. ’dEBS’.
 
SARAH
Hey, we’re here for information for a student film project—can you give us any information on a former councilman, Harold Marshal?
 
DEBS
Uh, yeah, I remember hearing about him from some of the councillors. There’s some public records about him—file room’s downstairs, first door on your left. Though actually, if you don’t mind coming back on Thursday, he --
 
Suddenly, the video cuts. When it returns, the audio is cleaner, and the camera is closer to DEBS.
 
DEBS
(a bit forced)
You are in luck! Harry Marshal, the man you seek, is in this very building today!
 
MARTHA
(from behind the camera, also forced)
Oh wow, it must be fate! Where can we find him?
 
Cut to: MEGAN, looking serious as she checks around her to make sure it’s only her, SARAH, and MARTHA, before sneaking exaggeratedly up to a nondescript door. Straightening, she knocks.
 
A VOICE FROM WITHIN
Come in.
 
They do. Inside is a man in a tweed suit, tidying up an office—he is old, though doesn’t appear old enough to have been a councilman in the 1960s. Despite this, his lanyard reads ‘HAROLD MARSHAL’. He glances towards the girls.
 
HARRY MARSHAL
Ah, you must be the students Debs told me about. I understand you want to know more about my time in the council? It’s wonderful to see you young ’uns taking an interest in local politics and history.
 
He smiles, perching on the edge of the table and leaning back.
 
HARRY MARSHAL
So, what did you want to ask me?
 
MEGAN
Well actually, we wanted to ask about a man you knew, back in the 60s. Does the name ‘Francis Bilge’ mean anything to you?
 
HARRY looks wistful for a moment, and then freezes. His eyes seem cold as he answers.
 
HARRY MARSHAL
I think you’d better leave.
 
The camera looks between SARAH and MEGAN’s confused faces then back at HARRY.
 
SARAH
We didn’t mean to offend, we were just curious --
 
HARRY MARSHAL
(almost shouting)
LEAVE! I have… things to attend to. If you’ll excuse me.
 
He quickly shepherds the trio out of the room, slamming the door. The camera focuses on that closed door, and we hear a cross between a scream and a sob before the screen fades to black. When we fade in again, we see MEGAN and SARAH, on a street.
 
MEGAN
After that strange reaction, we knew we were on the right track. We --
 
There is a cough from behind her.
 
MEGAN
— Sarah read through Marshal’s public records from City Hall, but what she found didn’t help much.
 
As SARAH speaks, various scans of documents like marriage licenses and property records appear on screen.
 
SARAH
While Bilge likely never married, the same could not be said of Marshal, who married a woman named Esther in the 1980s, though they didn’t live together for long. They divorced the day after same-sex marriage was legalized, and she remarried to a woman named Joan the following year. Considering the students’ stories, is it possible that Esther and Harold were mutual beards, pretending to be straight through marriage in order to hide their sexuality? With this in mind, it’s possible that --
 
SARAH looks at MEGAN, who gives her an encouraging nod. There’s a sigh from behind the camera before SARAH continues --
 
Marshal and Bilge were lovers, and Bilge’s disappearance was something more sinister than a man trying to escape from the public eye. Could it have been a lover’s spat with a horrible ending? Is it possible that we are about to uncover a decades-old murder? Despite the lack of fresh leads, we are more determined than ever to uncover the truth.
 
MEGAN
We’re journeying to the city library in order to read old transcripts of council meetings. Could Bilge’s disappearance be related to a dispute over something Marshal did in an official capacity? One thing is certain: we’re onto something, something big. And we can’t stop now.
 
Cut to SARAH flicking through pieces of paper with MEGAN leaning close by. The camera lens is adjusted, minutely, again and again, almost bored. MEGAN notices.
 
MEGAN,
(hushed but desperate)
Martha, do something!
 
Once again, the screen shows superimposed clips of SARAH slogging through mounds of research, against a classical music score. Suddenly, this jolts to a stop --
 
SARAH
I’ve found something!
 
The camera and MEGAN crowd around to see the papers SARAH is holding —- transcripts of a council meeting from 1978.
 
SARAH
I’ve found a few transcripts where Bilge and Marshal appear together—after the council gets wind of the school and starts to take it seriously, they talk about incorporating it into the city properly. Making it a public institution. Marshal argues it’s good because the school will get more funding, but Bilge always sounds… angry. Like he’s having something taken away. But, listen to this bit:
 
MARSHAL: I’m only doing what’s best for you.
BILGE: You don’t get to decide what’s best for me! You don’t know me, Harry.
MARSHAL: Of course I know you, and I know that with time, you’ll come around. But this school needs federal funding, and it needs it now. We can’t wait for you to come around—just skip the theatrics and do what’s right for your school.
BILGE: You dare make those kinds of assumptions about me and mine? Go ruin some other institution—take over another school. Build a new one if you have to, just, stay away from mine. This isn’t what I want. You don’t know me as well as you think you do.
MARSHAL: Frankie --
BILGE: Don’t. Just… don’t. The day the government gets its grubby hands on my school is the last day I’m ever seen in this town.
 
MEGAN
That… that sounds like he followed through on his promise. Maybe he really did choose to leave. Couldn’t bear to see his beloved institution of privacy turned into something so public.
 
MARTHA
But this way, more kids get to learn from the place he built. And, the headteachers still honor his legacy now—it’s not like what he was working for was all swept away.
 
SARAH
I don’t think it’s only about that. Back home, our schools are controlled by the government—which is miles better than ones who only let kids in who can pay to go, of course! But, the specific way the system is configured means our teachers and students aren’t free. We learn only what the people in power think we should be learning, and behave only the way we are told we must behave. That’s not freedom.
 
MEGAN
So, if Bilge just wanted to be free from surveillance, from judgement, from the law… where would he go? Sarah, did you find anything else?
 
SARAH
Wait, there’s something else… It might be nothing, but, in 1979, when the council was finalising its transfer of power over Hughes, an objector came into the town hall, and was dragged out after he was recognized.
 
MARTHA (OS)
(from behind the camera)
Wait, I thought the council got involved in the late Sixties?
 
SARAH
Yeah, that’s when they started to take notice of Bilge’s little operation, but they were convinced to stay pretty hands-off until around the time the school moved location, in 1975. And it looks like the man who was keeping them away was the same man who confronted the objector in 1979—one Councilman Harold Marshal.
 
MEGAN
Gasp!
 
MARTHA
Did you just. Did you just say the word ‘gasp’ --
 
MEGAN
This is it! This has to mean something! Look at the transcript --
 
She snatches a piece of paper away from SARAH, clears her throat, and begins to read.
 
MEGAN
COUNCILMAN HUGHES: Okay, any final comments on the upcoming school acquisition?
AUDIENCE MEMBER: I have a comment.
HUGHES: Alright, but, make it quick. Please state your name for the record.
AUDIENCE MEMBER (READING FROM NOTES): My name is Mr. Townsend, and I am a local resident who is thoroughly concerned about this acquisition. This school is currently a bastion of independent learning, unmarred by the fickle whims of the status quo. What that school teaches does not change based on the current administration’s beliefs—they teach the truth, whatever that happens to be, and they prepare young people for further education in a way that cannot be wholly entrusted to an increasingly corrupt and deceitful --
COUNCILMAN MARSHAL: Townsend? I know that name --
TOWNSEND:—government, which refuses to prioritize the real and immediate needs of its people, serving themselves and their party above --
MARSHAL: No, I know that voice! Francis Bilge, you have been banned from this hall, you cannot simply don a fake beard and expect us to listen to your unhinged ramblings!
“TOWNSEND”:—the constituents they are meant to be serving. And, it is with this in mind --
MARSHAL: Stop talking, Frankie, you’re embarrassing yourself.
“TOWNSEND”:—that I strongly oppose the --
MARSHAL: SECURITY!
 
MARTHA
Woah, that got out of hand.
 
SARAH
All of Bilge’s students said they were close… What happened? Could this be motive?
 
MEGAN
Wait, there’s more—it looks like the stenographer caught part of a conversation between Marshal and Bilge, after Bilge was dragged out of the meeting:
 
MARSHAL: I can’t believe you. And, this disguise, really? I’d recognize you anywhere, especially with that damn alias. I know you. I know you love that show. What were you going to tell us your first name was, Charlie?
BILGE: Didn’t expect to get that far.
MARSHAL: That’s your problem—you never think these things through. You see yourself as fighting for justice, but you’re really just fighting against progress. You’ll see—this’ll be good for the school. Could even be good for you. I can make your life better, if you let me.
BILGE: This isn’t what I want. I won’t stand for it.
MARSHAL: Well, you’ll have to, because the motion’s passing. Your school’s ours, Frankie.
BILGE: Don’t call me that. Not anymore.
MARSHAL: Frank --
BILGE: If you do this, don’t expect me to just stand here and watch. I won’t let this happen.
MARSHAL: And, when it does?
BILGE: I don’t expect to be around to see it.
MARSHAL: Frank --
BILGE: Goodbye, Harry.
 
MARTHA
Wow.
 
SARAH
Yeah.
 
MEGAN
Gay people were even more dramatic in the Seventies…
 
MARTHA
That’s homophobic, Megan.
 
MEGAN
I’m a lesbian, Martha.
 
MARTHA
Oh. Makes sense.
 
MEGAN
What?
 
MARTHA
All those carabiners you wear. I did wonder—good for you!
 
SARAH
Anyway, as touching as all this is, it sounds like we have a new lead.
 
MEGAN
What do you mean?
 
SARAH
Look there, at the top of the page—it gives descriptions of the people talking. And it says that our ‘Charlie Townsend’ had a bag with a pizza box sticking out of it. Look at the brand.
 
MEGAN
Volare. They’re on the high street—let’s move.
 
The girls are now entering Volare, an Italian restaurant. The sign above the door reads, “Proudly serving Violethill since 1964”. MEGAN strides confidently up to the counter.
 
MEGAN
Hello, we’re here looking for someone. Might’ve been a regular, a while back. Does the name ‘Bilge’ mean anything to you?
 
WOMAN BEHIND THE COUNTER
Uh, no, but I haven’t been here as long as my grandmother—let me get her for you.
 
She leaves, returning with an old lady, at least in her eighties.
 
VALENTINA
Hello, I’m Valentina, I’ve been here since this place first opened. Who are you looking for, lovelies?
 
MEGAN
Francis Bilge. It’s for a school project.
 
VALENTINA
Oh, how wonderful! But I’m afraid I can’t help you—no Bilge. I’d know.
 
MEGAN
That’s a shame. Thanks anyway.
 
SARAH
Wait, I’ve got another idea—Valentina, how about a Charles Townsend?
 
VALENTINA
Oh, yes, Charles! We get orders for him all the time. Delivers out to the middle of the woods. Impossible to get to, but my girls always find a way. No idea what he looks like, though.
 
SARAH
That’s alright, you’ve been a big help. I don’t suppose someone could show us where exactly he can be found?
 
Cut to: SARAH and MEGAN are trailing through the woods, their clothes dirty and covered in twigs.
 
MEGAN
I. Regret. Everything.
 
SARAH
Aren’t you excited? We must be close… There, just up ahead!
 
MEGAN
Yep, that sure is a creepy cabin.
 
SARAH
It’s exactly where the woman said it was. This is it, I can feel it!
 
The camera swivels to focus on her.
 
SARAH
The electricity, running through my veins… We’re finally going to find out the truth. He really might still be alive…
 
She finishes the hike up the door and raises her fist, ready to knock.
 
SARAH
You ready?
 
MEGAN nods, as does the camera.
 
SARAH
Then here. We. G--
 
There’s a small cut, probably just a glitch, and the camera swivels to show an OLD MAN, brandishing a rifle.
 
MAN
What are you doing here?? Damn kids—get off my property!!
 
SARAH
Wait, are you—Ahh!
 
The MAN shoots once, into the air, then levels the gun at SARAH.
 
MAN
I SAID, GET!
 
The girls shriek and start running. The camera drops, bumpily filming the forest floor, and the students’ laboured breathing is loud and clear as they race away from the cabin. Finally, some safe distance away, they stop and catch their breaths.
 
MEGAN
Could that have been him? Really, actually him?
 
MARTHA
No! You idiots, that was some wacko who was probably going to kill us! I don’t care how engrossed you are in this mystery—theater club isn’t worth dying for! We don’t even get a damn credit!
 
SARAH
I don’t care. I have to know! Aren’t you curious? Aren’t you excited? We are on the verge of uncovering something big!
 
MEGAN
Martha’s right, Sarah. Recent experiences have taught me to be more cautious—the only thing we’re on the verge of is being the subjects of our own missing person’s documentary. I’ve had enough of that for one lifetime. Come on, let’s go back.
 
SARAH
I’m sorry, I didn’t think… You shouldn’t have to risk yourselves just to satisfy my curiosity. You’re right—the tale of Francis Bilge ends here.
 
The camera fades out as the girls start walking back. The screen stays back for a few moments, then…
 
SARAH
(whispering)
Okay, it’s late now, and it’s just me. If I have to do this on my own, I will.
 
The camera swings to show the street ahead as SARAH walks. It’s dark out, and she’s wearing all black. She reaches the edge of the forest, and turns the camera back around to face herself.
 
SARAH
Whatever the cost.
 
For a while, she’s just picking her way through the leaves. It’s calm at night. Peaceful. Suddenly, she lets out a cry—the camera turns to show her leg tangled around some barbed wire.
 
SARAH
Shit, shit!
 
She struggles to pull it off, scraping her hands, until the sound of footsteps makes her stop.
 
OLD MAN
So, you didn’t listen.
 
The camera cuts to SARAH and the MAN sitting inside a log cabin, an empty box from Volare sitting by the lit fireplace.
 
MAN
Yes, I am Francis Bilge. I retired quietly many years ago to this little spot of land. It’s technically not under any council, and so I can do what I like here. This is my place. I miss the children, shaping young minds, but leaving was necessary—I had to escape, before it became impossible. You can’t just hide from the world anymore. You can’t be alone.
 
SARAH
Most people don’t want to be alone.
 
BILGE
Better than being trapped, believe me. But I’ve had a good life—I carve bug hotels now.
 
SARAH
Huh.
 
BILGE
What, there’s something wrong with bug hotels? You have a problem with a bug the size of your pinkie nail?
 
SARAH
No, no, of course not! I’m not feuding with bugs. I just thought, I don’t know… If you’ve spent all this time away from people, you might be starting to miss the company.
 
BILGE
Sometimes.
 
SARAH
You know, your school still honors your legacy. There’s over a thousand students now, and they’re taught the importance of privacy and anonymity—the headteachers set an example. There aren’t even any photos of the current head! I’ve never even seen her, only heard her voice. The school never moved on, Mr. Bilge—it’s still very much yours.
 
BILGE
Thank you, Sarah. If you hadn’t come here tonight, I never would have known all the good that managed to survive.
 
The video fades to be the walk back down the forest, and towards the school, as BILGE’s voice continues over the top.
 
BILGE
My goal when I started teaching the local children was simple: provide the education they just weren’t getting anywhere else. I was filling a niche, that’s all. But, as the years went by, I quickly realized that I had become something more for these children—a place of refuge from a propagandized world. I wasn’t just teaching them their letters and numbers; I was teaching them how to be themselves, individuals, without complying to the rules. I was teaching them how to be free.
 
I saw the way such tight documentation meant risk. It meant kids who just wanted to learn could be identified and ripped away because some politician decided they shouldn’t be there; meant people who wanted to live as themselves had a paper trail to their former lives; meant women couldn’t escape abusive situations. People knew too much about other people, could keep track… It’s dangerous. We need to learn how to help people hide… and how to stay hidden.
 
Having reached the school, the video fades to an image at the same angle in black-and-white, of the school from decades ago. Finally, words appear on the screen:
 
The search for Francis Bilge is over.
 
We will continue his legacy by making sure that this film is never seen by the public. This way, he can remain, forever,
 
Hidden.
 
‘ ‘ ‘ click restart to watch again’ ’ ’

As the screen faded to black, Cwej put his hands together and started clapping. “Woo, yeah, brilliant documentary! Well done! Though, Sang Mi,” he said, turning to the girl sitting on the sofa next to him, popcorn bowl in hand, “You may be able to fool other people, but you can’t fool me. I know you too well by now.”
​
Sang Mi put on her most innocent face, toying with an unpopped kernel absent-mindedly as she answered. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“If you were in real danger, I know you would have told me. And you definitely would have told him about the impact he had on his students, just like you promised, if that had been the real Bilge. Besides, your acting was good, but the editing was far from perfect—it couldn’t hide the glitches of cut footage. What really happened when you went into that cabin?” Cwej’s voice was stern; it was his best teacher’s voice. He was rather proud of it, and, after spending so much effort perfecting it, he was a little annoyed at the idea that he was unlikely to ever need it again.

Sang Mi sighed, but relented. “Fiiiinneee. Megan said the truth was too boring, so we roped Martha’s grandpa into playing Bilge. If you want to see what we found, the raw footage is there if you scroll through the drive—there was nothing. Totally empty, save for that pizza box, and an old encyclopedia. Probably just a squatter.” Her words came too fast, and her shrug was a little too practised. Cwej told her as much.

“Come on. You don’t really buy that. The girl who saw the same cat years apart and dropped everything to go chasing after it would never accept that it was ‘just a squatter’. What about the alias used to order the pizzas being the same one Francis Bilge used in that town hall? How would a squatter have known that?”

“Okay, yes, it is bothering me, but there’s nothing more I can do. We’re leaving too soon to keep investigating—and besides, if this has taught me anything, it’s that some stones are best left unturned.” She stood up, looking around at the few things she’d brought with her from Gongen, all scattered around. “I’d better pack. Goodnight, Chris.”

“Wait, Sang Mi?”

She stopped, turning. “Yeah?”

“Who did you get to play the Councilman?”

She frowned. “Marshal? No one, that bit was real—well, he wasn’t ‘conveniently on site’, we had to wait a couple days, but, that really was him. Why?”

Cwej stared at her, hard, like he was trying to see through her lies. There weren’t any. He shook his head. “Nothing, nevermind. Go, get some sleep.” 

Even after she’d left the room, Cwej still couldn’t stop thinking about the mystery of Francis Bilge. It just didn’t make any sense—he could almost buy into the conspiracy theories that he’d been murdered by his lover in a fit of passion, or taken out by Councilman Hughes so the council could take over his school once and for all… but no matter what he came up with, none of it could explain how a man who was at the very least in his thirties, likely older, still looked middle-aged nearly fifty years later. Like a dog with a bone, he couldn’t let it go—determined, almost shaking with anticipation, he played the raw footage, scanning for any possible clue. 

It was all like Sang Mi said. The girls had entered the cabin to find nothing more than a pizza box and a book. No man. No clues. Nothing. Wait --

“Is that…” 

Cwej squinted at the book on the screen. It was an old, leatherbound thing, cracked and worn, but the title was just about visible. He should have noticed. He should have remembered… 

Bilge’s Encyclopedia of the Universe. Known by every universal traveller, it contained information on anything and everything the universe had to offer, fitting an impossible amount of information into what was surely a limited-space hologrammic book. The handy guide to everywhere… and no one knew where it came from. 

He’d always wondered if he had an entry.

Cwej closed the computer and looked back towards the stairs towards where Sang Mi must by now be asleep, and then towards the door. 

The choice was easy.

He slipped out of the rented house and towards the forest, burdened by only a little guilt at not involving his travelling companion. His heart hammered out a rhythm too fast to count. He picked his way through the pathless woods—he remembered the direction the students had taken well, as it was shown in the documentary several times—and soon arrived at the cabin.

This was alien. This was time-travel. This was big, and here he was, alone and unarmed with enough adrenaline coursing through his system to make him feel every soft whisper of wind like a slice across his cheek, every twig like a sword and every sound, every sound… 

The forest was different at night.

Sang Mi hadn’t found anything, but she hadn’t been here when it was like this. In the dark, no one could see you move. In the dark, cold, dead of night, no one save the birds and the insects were there to hear. In the dark…

It didn’t matter. If Bilge showed himself, it would only be to Chris Cwej, and no one else would know. He could stay invisible, if he chose. And Cwej would be happy, if only he knew the truth, just for him, a little secret to wrap it all up in a neat little bow and satisfy his curiosity. Curiosity killed the cat, not the Cwej. Curiosity kills those who need to stay hidden.

He couldn’t stop himself. Hand on the door now, he pushed, hard. No need to knock—there would have been no answer. Not here. Too dangerous.

Cwej slammed his body against the door until it gave, and stepped inside.

And, as to what he found there? That’s anyone’s guess. Some things we aren’t meant to know. For safety, for privacy, for the sake of a quiet life, a little piece of freedom. Some things are best kept hidden.

One thing that we can know is that, when Cwej got back to the house that night, he picked up a red pen. On the top right-hand corner of the theater club final project cover letter, he wrote down a letter, wrapped in a loose circle.

This truth does not have to remain hidden: Sang Mi, Megan, and Martha’s project received a very well-deserved ‘A’.

* * *

Lance had been perching on the countertop during much of Cwej’s story. They looked down at the piece of paper Cwej had handed them: it was the cover letter of the project, detailing the reasons the students had chosen to delve into the history of their school’s elusive founder. They handed it back to Cwej, then smiled.

“Good story. Shame you won’t tell me what you really saw in that cabin, though.”

“Yeah, I’ve been wondering that too.” Sang Mi narrowed her eyes at Cwej, who floundered under the glare.

“I was trying to create mystique! Some questions aren’t meant to be answered. So, was it good enough to pay for our snacks?”

Lance laughed. “Well, it better be, considering you’ve already eaten most of them. Though, before you get back to, well, wherever it is you’re going, I was wondering something.”

“Oh?”

“What were you two doing at that school, anyway?”

Cwej looked at Sang Mi, and then back at the cashier. “That’s a long story. And, I think the cost of telling it would be more inventory than your shop holds.”

Lance smirked. “Alright, keep your secrets. Thanks for making my day a little more interesting.”

“Any time,” Cwej said, and he and Sang Mi made their way back to the car. They had many miles of humdrum, identical stretches of road to go, but they were both in slightly higher spirits. At least today, even if only for a few minutes, got to be a little different.

​Chris and Jhe Sang Mi cruised down the open road, the bright orange bodywork of the Honda Element shining ever brighter in the light of the dusk sky. Sang Mi’s eyes began to droop as the falling sun became masked by a border of tall trees. 

“Get some shut-eye if you need it,” said Chris. “It’ll be some time before the next stop.”

“It’s alright,” said Sang Mi, rubbing her eyes. “It’s not fair for you to drive in the dark without some distraction.” She grinned. “Besides, my world isn’t exactly known for its lush greenery. Who knows what’s hiding beneath those trees.”

“Exactly,” said Chris, a little graver than Sang Mi was expecting. 

“What’s wrong?” she asked. “Not a fan of the big spooky woods?”

He shuffled in his seat, adjusting the seat belt. “I’m not sure,” he said with a frown. “I’ve just got a weird feeling, that’s all.”

“A weird feeling because of the big spooky woods?” Sang Mi poked.

Chris’s frown deepened, and Sang Mi cottoned on that it wasn’t the sort of conversation to joke around in. 

“Chris, what’s wrong?”

“I don’t know,” he repeated, cracking his neck and wincing. “I can… feel that something isn’t right, like, in my bones.”

Sang Mi held back on making a joke about his age. “I don’t feel anything,” she said. 

“Hmm,” said Chris. “I’m sure it’s nothing.” He offered her a weak smile. “Anyways, the sun’s hanging low. Let’s push on and try to find a motel before morning.”

The car drove into the treeline, and after how long the day had been darkness descended too quickly. Sang Mi got a buzz of excitement watching the trees whiz past. The trees looked alien to her. The more she thought about it, the more she realized that feeling felt wrong. This was humanity’s home, or so they said. Her world had no trees, and instead huge machines provided the oxygen she needed to breathe. Somehow, she felt cheated by that. 

A blur of movement caught her attention. Sang Mi craned her neck to see a deer galloping through the woodland. She beamed at the sight. 

“Hey, look!” she called to Chris, nudging him with her elbow so hard that he almost lost control of the wheel. 

“What?” asked Chris, desperately assessing the road in front of him to make sure there wasn’t anything he’d missed.

“A deer in the trees,” Sang Mi explained, and pointed in the direction she’d made the sighting. 

When she looked back, the deer was gone without a trade. 

A twinge of disappointment washed over her. Still, she continued to look out of the window, hopeful of seeing something else in the wilderness beyond their vehicle. 

“This is really exciting you, isn’t it?” said Chris, with his amazing talent for pointing out the obvious. 

“It’s the mystery of it all,” said Sang Mi, grinning with all the joy of a child in a toy shop. “Nature is just allowed to do what it wants here. Within those trees could be absolutely anything. Back on Gongen, we sort of know what to expect: everything was built with schematics. Nature is just… wild.”

“Most people find that scary,” said Chris.

Not me, thought Sang Mi. If she had the choice, she’d have places planted like this all over Gongen. Perhaps one day she would. 

Peering out of the window once more, she studied the strips of grass at the side of the road. They had clearly been trimmed by humans to stop foliage from encroaching onto the travel route, but even so, compressed patches could be seen throughout, hinting at activity from the area wildlife. Sang Mi assumed that local fauna crossed the road often, oblivious of its significance to humans. 

Again Sang Mi’s eyes were drawn to movement. This time she gasped in terror. 

At the side of the road, peering out from behind the trunk of a tree, was a figure. 

It was around six feet tall, and vaguely humanoid in shape. Apart from that, Sang Mi could tell nothing more. Its features were non-existent. Not shadowed by the scarcity of light. Black. And as quickly as Sang Mi had spotted the figure, its rounded head slunk back behind the tree and out of sight. 

“What’s wrong?” asked Chris, this time making sure to keep his eyes on the road to avoid an accident.

Sang Mi was as white as a sheet. “There was… something out there.”

“What do you mean ’something’?” asked Chris, dismissively. “Of course there is. They’ll be foxes and all sorts out there.”

“No, no, no,” said Sang Mi, trying to convey her seriousness. “It was something else. Something odd.”

“Odd,” said Chris, not totally buying in, likely due to her overexcitement at seeing a deer. 

“It was a figure,” Sang Mi explained, or at least tried to. “Except, everything about it was just… black.”

Chris frowned. “Are you sure you don’t need that nap? I really don’t mind. After that scare you gave me with the deer, I think I will be alert for hours.”

Sang Mi was starting to get irritated. “Chris, I’m serious. There was something out there.”

“Alright, I believe you,” Chris said, in the most unconvincing way possible. 

Sang Mi rolled her eyes in annoyance, and tried to resist the urge to punch him in the arm. Instead, she took a deep breath, and refocused her attention outside. 

Another figure, ahead, peering out from behind a tree on her side of the road. 

“There!” Sang Mi bellowed, pointing.

Chris leaned over the steering wheel to get a closer look. His straining eyes and rapid blinks told Sang Mi he hadn’t seen anything. 

“Sorry,” he told her, “I didn’t see anything.” This time, however, something about his tone told her he wasn’t quite ready to dismiss it. 

“Do you still have that weird feeling?” Sang Mi asked.

“It never went away,” Chris confirmed. 

Sang Mi kept her eyes on the treeline, and sure enough, another black figure came into view, staring at them, just like the others, from the cover of a trunk. 

“Don’t worry, I see it this time,” said Chris, before Sang Mi had the chance. 

The two of them both tried to grasp something, anything they could of what the creature looked like, but again, even in the headlights of the car, aside from its otherwise human-like shape, all they saw of it was shadow. 

“What the hell is it?” asked Sang Mi. Her heart raced as she watched the figure retreat behind the tree once the car drew near.

“No idea,” said Chris. “But I’m willing to bet it has something to do with my weird feeling.”

Chris drove the Honda down the lonely forest track, and as they spied, once every ten or twenty trees they passed, more figures cloaked in darkness spied back.

“There’s more of them now,” said Sang Mi, pointing to a tree at Chris’s side of the road, where the silhouette of two heads were visible behind a nearby tree. Slightly further ahead, two more figures stood at the side of the road on the grass verge. Even in the full beam of the headlights, and obscured by no obstacle, the figures remained bathed in darkness. The only new feature they could see was that they were truly humanoid: two arms, two legs, one head. Everything else was black. 

“Chris, watch out!”

Another humanoid figure appeared in the headlights. Sang Mi only had time to notice a mop of long curly hair and a red coat before Chris slammed on the breaks. Tyres screeched and the two of them clenched their teeth. The car came skidding to a halt in the nick of time. 

Standing, bathed in the glow of the headlights, was an elderly man dressed in tattered jeans and a thick burgundy pea coat. His bedraggled grey hair and untrimmed beard made him look like he hadn’t washed in weeks. 

Sang Mi breathed a sigh of relief. Their trip across America had been weird enough without killing Santa as well.

“I don’t believe it,” said Chris, unlocking the doors. 

Sang Mi grabbed his arm. “What are you doing?” she hissed. “Those creatures are out there!”

Chris ignored her protest and yanked himself free of her grasp. He opened the door, planted one foot on the ground and hauled himself out of the car.

“Of all the places in the world to run into Charles Zoltan, a dark forest in the middle of America was the last place I would have expected.”

Sang Mi was surprised, and quietly relieved, to see that the old man was familiar to Chris. 

“Christopher Cwej!” The old man beamed with the kindest smile Sang Mi had ever seen. Maybe he is Santa, she thought. “What in the heavens are you doing here?”

“I’m on a road trip,” said Chris, by way of piss poor explanation. “What about you?”

“I think you might have a good idea,” said Zoltan, “If you’ve seen our friends in the woods.”

Sang Mi wanted to leave the car and join them, but the thought of the shadowy figures kept her inside. 

“They must be trouble if they’ve got you on a plane from England.” He paused for a moment, scratching his head. “I have got the year right, haven’t I? You are working for SIGNET?”

“Yes, yes,” the kindly old man replied. “Thought let’s try and stay light on the spoilers, if you don’t mind.”

“Sorry,” said Chris. “I forgot that you don’t like time travellers.”

“It’s not that I don’t like time travellers,” Charles explained. “It’s that I don’t like having things spoiled. Loose lips can reveal all sorts of things, and I prefer ignorance. How can life be fun if you know what’s coming?” He caught sight of Sang Mi watching from the passenger seat. “Who is your friend? She doesn’t look like Yanna or Roslyn.”

“Sang Mi,” said Chris. “Come on out,” he called to her. “Charles won’t bite.”

“What about those creatures?” she called back, heart pounding. “They don’t seem to be as nice.”

“It’s alright,” said Charles. “You’re safe enough with us.”

Something about the old man made Sang Mi instantly believe him. She unbuckled her seat belt, opened the door, and raced over to them as fast as her legs could carry her. Instinctively casting a look behind her, she started as three figures stood in the middle of the road behind the car. Motionless. Watching. 

“It’s okay,” said Charles, pulling her close. “They’re here for the same reason as me.”

“What are they?” asked Chris. “I’ve never seen anything like them.”

“They’re known as shadow people,” Charles answered. “Beyond that, I know as little as you. They show up at the scene of mysterious events. Or don’t. There’s never any pattern to their behaviour.” 

“And what brings them to the woods in the middle of Indiana is…?”

“I’m not yet sure,” admitted Charles. “But we’ll get no answers standing around here. Come on.”

He set off in the direction of the woods. 

“Hold on,” said Chris, “Let me get my rifle.”

“You won’t need that,” Charles chided. “You never do!”

“And a torch,” said Chris, paying no heed. 

Chris headed to the car and returned a moment later with his hefty space-age laser rifle and a bog standard 21st century LED torch. “Sorry,” he said to Sang Mi. “I only have one.”

“I can help you there, young lady,” said Charles, delving into the inside pockets of his coat. “I always carry a spare after watching those horror films: why do they only ever have one torch - It’s obvious the batteries are going to run out!” He handed a small, pencil shaped torch to her.

Sang Mi pressed the button on the base of the torch and a surprisingly strong beam of light came forth, lighting up the silhouette of another shadow figure in the treeline. Sang Mi’s heart skipped a beat, and to her relief, the shadow figure skulked out of sight soon after. 

* * *

The walk through the woods was arduous. Every step of the way, Sang Mi’s heart banged like a drum. Although Charles and Chris by now were happy to ignore the shadow figures as they traversed the network of brambles and thickets, Sang Mi felt the same pang of fear each time one of them came into view.

“Have they been known to hurt people before?” 

The question had been burning on Sang Mi’s mind for some time, and until now had been too scared to ask through fear of what the answer may be. 

“Not by any testimony I’ve heard,” answered Charles. “Though they are able to interact with our world with some manner of physicality.”

Sang Mi sighed. That wasn’t the answer she had wanted to hear. 

As Charles carved the path forwards, Chris dropped back to stay with Sang Mi. 

“Are you okay?” he asked. 

“I’m a girl from Gongen being led through a thick woodland in the dead of night by a man I don’t know with featureless shadow creatures watching me at every turn.” She looked Chris in the eyes. “I’ve been better.”

Chris threw her a look that said, “I know this isn’t ideal, but let’s just stick with it and see what happens.”

It didn’t placate her, so Sang Mi asked: “Who is Charles anyway? How do you know him?”

“Charles runs an investigative group called SIGNET, who look into weird goings on in the hopes of saving people. We left the projector with their receptionist, before, well, the whole World’s Fair thing. They’re a bit like us, I suppose, but a little more domestic. I’ve met Charles a few times over the years, battling cosmic threats, and a particularly nasty Korrovax in Manchester. His mother was a nice lady too: unapologetically kind. Losing her really affected him.”

“So he’s here investigating the shadow people?” 

“Investigating what’s brought them here!” Charles called back, from quite a distance ahead. 

Chris and Sang Mi shared a look. He must have heard everything they were saying!

“And what is that, Charles?” asked Chris. “We’re clearly heading somewhere!”

Ahead, Charles stopped in his tracks, and shone his torch in the distance. Through a jagged sea of branches, Sang Mi could make out the outlines of buildings. Chris quickened his pace, and Sang Mi followed. 

“They look like farm buildings,” said Chris as they neared the structures. 

Already Sang Mi could see shadow people gathered in groups of threes and fours around bails of hay and stacks of farm equipment. One shadow person in particular had three long, slender fingers that reached down to where Sang Mi assumed were its knees. The sight freaked her out more. 

“If they’re here for a reason, then why are they just standing around?” asked Sang Mi.

“I wish I had an answer for you,” said Charles. “Whenever shadow people have been said to interact with the physical world, it always seems to happen when they aren’t being observed.”

“Where do we go now?” asked Chris, shuffling uncomfortably. “These things are really starting to make me feel-”

“Like something bad is going to happen?” finished Charles. 

“Yeah,” said Chris. “I’ve felt it ever since we entered these woods.”

“They have a habit of making people feel like that,” said Charles, stroking his beard.
“I’ve felt it ever since I got off the plane in Indianapolis.”

“I haven’t felt like that at all,” said Sang Mi. “Just absolutely freaking terrified.”

Chris shrugged. “Must be universal differences,” he said. “I get the sense that these things, whatever they are, are very primal to our universe. It’s very likely that yours doesn’t have them at all.”

“I should hope not!” said Sang Mi. And for the first time in a while, she longed to be back in her own bed in Gongen.

Charles led them into the centre of the farmyard. Three buildings surrounded them: a shed for livestock, a barn, and a farmhouse. 

“Where first?” asked Sang Mi. 

Chris began striding towards the farmhouse. “In there,” he said. “Look!”

At first glance, Sang Mi thought she saw a shadow figure, slumped against a window. However, as Chris shone his torch over it, she instead saw a decaying face of rotting flesh staring back at her, jaw open in abject terror. She froze, and immediately turned away, stumbling. Closing her eyes, she tried to push the image out of her head, and the numbing feeling flowing through her like she wasn’t quite in her own body. She ran her hands over each other, trying to focus on the feeling and blot the corpse behind her out of her mind.

She jumped a little when she felt Chris hand on her shoulder. “Will you be okay?”

Nodding, she tried to give him a reassuring smile. “Y-yeah. I’ve got this one under control.”

“You sure?”

She nodded, and he squeezed her shoulder and walked past her to inspect the remains.
Charles was looking at her, his eyes filled with a pained wisdom that showed he knew exactly what she was dealing with in that moment. That he’d seen it countless times before. 

“Chin up, we won’t leave you behind.”

She gave him a reassuring smile too, but it had become a little more honest. “Thanks, you should go help Chris.”

In a moment, Charles was at Chris’s side, keeping pace despite his advanced age. Sang Mi steadied herself, and by the time she caught up, the two men were standing over the body, making assessments over what had happened. She kept her distance, but despite her stomach rolling over in her chest and a bit of lightheadedness, was holding it together better than she expected with the presence of Charles and Chris.

“No immediate cause of death,” Chris noted, examining the way the corpse was leaning against the window, as though trying to open the door. 

“Her clothes seem intact,” agreed Charles, shining his torch over what Sang Mi assumed, beneath the maggots and grime, was a dress.

Sang Mi cast her torch across the room, looking for anything that could have caused the unfortunate lady’s death, and eager for an excuse to look away from the body. Aside from a thin layer of dust, the room appeared to be an otherwise normal kitchen: empty worktops, a cooker, and fridge unit against the back wall. It was only when she shone her torch into the adjoining room, that Sang Mi found something else amiss. 

“Guys, in here…” 

Sang Mi’s torch focused on another body, lying face down on the carpet. He was male, so far as could be seen from his broad build. Charles was the first to reach the body, and gently rolled him over with his foot. The decaying face staring back at them was young, barely any older than Sang Mi herself. 

She looked at Chris, and saw his jaw set with rage. 

“Chris?” she asked with concern.

He didn’t reply. Instead he raised his rifle, returned to the kitchen and aimed it at the three shadow figures visible through the window. Without warning, he fired. The sound of shattering glass was almost cacophonous after the silence that preceded it. 
 
“What are you doing!” Charles bellowed, running into the kitchen.

“They’ve killed these people,” said Chris, tears of anger streaming down his face. “He was just a boy!”

Sang Mi looked through the window. The shadow people hadn’t moved, and seemed completely unphased by the laser bolt that had passed through them.

“They haven’t killed anyone,” said Charles. His tone was as soft as velvet. Sang Mi wasn’t aware of how anxious she was feeling until it soothed her restless nerves. Charles placed a hand on Chris’s shoulder. “I know it’s made you angry, Chris. The thought that he could be Sang Mi must have been overwhelming to think about. But it isn’t the shadow people who have done this. Something else is at fault here, and violence won’t be the way we’ll put things right.”

Sang Mi was taken aback by Charles’ words, his ability to think clearly despite discovering the loss of a young life. While Chris’s way of doing things was looking danger in the eye, rifle in hand, she saw that Charles’ was compassion, patience, and the conviction to resolve a situation without violence. She began to realise that much could be learned from the old man, by both herself and Chris. 

“So what do we do?” asked Chris, brought firmly back down to calm.

“What we always do,” said Charles with a wink. “Put wrongs to right.”

Leaving the house behind, Charles walked out into the middle of the farmstead, and closed his eyes. Chris and Sang Mi followed, watching as Charles slowed to a stop, closed his eyes, and faced each building in turn. As they watched, Sang Mi noticed Charles fiddling with something in his pocket. Sang Mi placed herself behind the old man in an attempt to view the contents. All she could see behind his fumbling hands was a warm glow of blue light. The sight of it soothed Sang Mi’s fears, even from the brief glimpses she caught. 

“It’s in there,” Charles announced, and strode off in the direction of the barn.

“What is?” Sang Mi whispered to Chris. “And what on earth is in his pocket?”

“It’s a pendant that once belonged to his mother,” Chris replied. “I’m not sure where it comes from, but it has remarkable divining abilities. I’d imagine it’s how Charles knew to come here all the way from England.”

Charles, Chris and Sang Mi entered the barn by way of a large arched door that had been left ajar. From the moment they entered, the stench of death was overpowering. 
The barn contained several bales of hay that dominated one end of the room. In the centre was a tractor, fitted with a large scoop. Beside the tractor was a sizable ditch, and a mound of loose soil. 

As the trio approached the ditch, they all seemed to know what they would find. Sure enough, at the centre of the ditch, was the body of a man staring up at them with a pained expression. He wore a checkered shirt, utility trousers, and thick brown boots. 
Charles held up his pendant in an outstretched hand. “Whatever caused this is here, with him.”

Wasting no time, Chris jumped into the ditch and began to examine the body. “I can’t see anything obvious,” said Chris. “Aside from the dirt on his clothes there isn’t a mark on him.” He thought for a moment. “Do you think the people inside the house were his family?”

“It would reckon so,” said Charles, shining his torch upon the body. His eyes narrowed as something caught his eye. “Something looks off about his neck,” he said. “Check his mouth.”

Crouching down, Chris pushed a finger between the man’s lips. Even this slightest of disturbances caused his jaw to snap. He leaned in for a closer look. “There’s something in here,” he said, pushing his hand in further. 

Chris turned back to his friends holding a smooth-faced stone, almost rectangular in shape. “There’s writing on it,” he added. “Not in any language I can read though, and I’m told I can read pretty much anything.”

“Give it here,” said Charles, and Chris threw the stone up to him. 

Sang Mi watched him examine the marble-like object. The colour of the stone was jet black, not too dissimilar from the shadow people, she noted. Etched upon it were a series of runes that appeared to defy observance. Each time Sang Mi tried to focus on a singular letter, its shape seemed to twist and morph before her eyes, and something in her mind willed her to look away. Charles seemed to be having the same problem, frowning and blinking as he attempted to will the words to reveal themselves. 

“It’s quite something,” Charles announced, giving up. “I can feel it tugging at my perceptions, trying to enter my mind. “I would say it’s Yssgarothic, but the runes on the tablet shard we have back at HQ are legible. Nothing like this.”

Sang Mi noticed that the pendant in his hand seemed to glow brighter as he held the stone. She looked down to Chris in the ditch, noticing how quiet he had been. The former Adjudicator stood motionless, head bowed, as if someone had flipped a switch and turned him off. 

“Chris, are you okay?”

Chris’s neck snapped around like a whip. Sang Mi gasped. 

His eyes looked to have sunk into his sockets, his skin pale and lifeless, veins visible beneath. He tried to speak, but only guttural, groaning noises were voiced. When Sang Mi looked into his eyes, he seemed to be begging her to help him. 

“What’s happened to him?” Sang Mi yelped. 

“The same thing that happened to those who lived here,” concluded Charles. “We have to do something before Chris joins them!”

Sang Mi looked around in panic. In the doorway, outside the windows, at the edges of the room by the hay bales, stood shadow people. 

“We’re trapped!” Sang Mi cried in panic. Whatever courage Charles’ stone had given her had long since melted away. Chris was going to die here, and she would be left alone here, with those things. 

“We’re not trapped,” insisted Charles. “They’re here because of the stone, just like we are.”

“Then why aren’t they doing anything?” said Sang Mi, tears of frustration forming in her eyes.

“Who says they aren’t?” Charles replied. “We know virtually nothing about them.” 

He held the stone out in front of him and tossed it up and down in his hand, thinking frantically of what to do. All the while, Chris grew more emaciated by the second. 

“The others died in the house,” Charles said suddenly. “So why is he here…”

Sang Mi’s mind raced faster than a gazelle on a dinner menu. “Because he was the last to die!” she realised. She surveyed her surroundings - ignoring the flocks of shadow people - noticing the tractor, its scoop, and the ditch. “He was trying to bury it!”

“And when he realised his time was short, tried to swallow it and threw himself in the ditch…” Charles finished. 

“So what do we do - try to finish the job he started?”

“It must have been how it was found,” Charles realised. “Somewhere here on the farm.”

He looked up to the driving seat of the tractor. “It’s been a while since I’ve used one of these, but needs must!” 

With the sprightliness of an acrobat, Charles mounted the tractor and climbed into the operator’s station. With the turn of a key the engines fired, spewing acrid fumes into the air. Sang Mi gagged - it was worse for the environment than the Honda!

A nearby thump gave Sang Mi cause for alarm. Chris had fallen to his knees, no longer able to stand. Without thinking, she jumped into the ditch after him, and began to pull him out of the way.

“What are you doing?” Charles shouted over the roar of the engine. “I was going to dig a new ditch.”

“No time,” Sang Mi replied. “The deeper it goes, the better. Hurry!”

Chris’s skin had become taught and leathery. Still, he held on, staring up at Sang Mi with apologetic eyes. 

“Don’t you get all soppy on me,” she cried. “We’ve got our road trip to finish.”

She held onto his hand, trying to ignore how much they felt like bone. 

The scoop of the tractor lowered, with impressive precision, as Charles sat at the controls, sweat beading on his brow. He cleaved several depressions into the dirt, delving deeper and deeper into the earth. Once satisfied, he cast the stone into the chasm he’d created and set to work filling it back in. Heap upon heap of earth was added on top of where the stone was buried. When the work was done, Charles raced over to Sang Mi and Chris. 

Sang Mi sobbed, holding onto Chris’s clammy hand. His face was gaunt, almost corpse-like. He tried to speak, but nothing more than a moan passed his leathery lips. 

“Why isn’t it working?” Sang Mi barked at Charles. 

The old man looked perplexed. 

“The stone is buried,” he muttered. “It should be finished, done!” He started to panic, fumbling in his pockets. His eyes widened. “The pendant!” He thrust the blue stone on its string into Chris’s open palm and closed it tight. “Come on. Don’t fail me now…”

The stone shone brighter than it had all night. Sang Mi had to avert her eyes, unable to look at it directly. Still Chris remained in his husk-like state. 

Sang Mi felt the hope drain from her soul. This was it, wasn’t it? Chris was going to die here, and she’d never be able to return home to Gongen.

In the corner of her vision, the shadow people moved back and forth. “Stay away from him,” Sang Mi cried. “Leave him alone!”

As she watched, the shadow people seemed to shuffle anxiously, like a toilet queue at a busy concert. They were closer than ever now, but didn’t seem to want to come any closer. 

“No, no,” said Charles. “We’re missing something. The stone has gone, yes, but they haven’t.” 

Sang Mi looked to the mound of dirt where the stone had been buried. Shadow people gathered around it like it was an epitaph. “They never stood near the stone before it was buried,” she said. “Now they’re all over it.” She looked behind her, spotting more shadow people there also. 

“Of course!” exclaimed Charles. “That’s why they didn’t leave when the stone was buried.” He grabbed Sang Mi by the wrist and pulled her behind him. Chris slid from her grip and hit the floor like a paperweight. 

“No!” Sang Mi bellowed. “We can’t leave him!”

“I’m sorry, Sang Mi,” said Charles. “But that’s exactly what we have to do.”

Charles dragged Sang Mi along behind him like a stropping child. Every step of the way she fought, kicked and screamed at him to release her, to return her to Chris. With each step she fought, Charles held firm, refusing to look back, not even for a second. 

Once they were outside of the barn, Charles closed the door, and released Sang Mi from his grasp. Sang Mi didn’t hesitate to try and return to the barn, but Charles stood by the door, as strong and passive as a bouncer at a nightclub. 

“Let me in!” she screamed.

“Not yet,” he pleaded. “Please.”

“He’ll die in there,” she begged, tears streaming. “I won’t let him die alone.”

“No one ever said it would come to that.”

Charles embraced Sang Mi in a bear hug. She crumbled, sinking to her knees in despair. The old man held on tight and, whilst she sobbed in his arms, he sang an old tune, of sailors lost and lovers found. Sang Mi found it oddly soothing, yet the tears continued to flood. 

Sang Mi cried for an age. She only stopped upon hearing the creak of wood. When she looked up she saw Chris staring down at her, a confused look etched across his brow.

“What on earth are you crying for?”

Sang Mi blinked, stared, and blinked again. She rubbed her eyes and looked once more. Chris was standing there, as fresh as he had looked that morning.

“Am I dead?” she asked. 

“Nope,” said Chris. “Am I?”

“She thought you were,” said Charles, releasing her from his embrace. “She just needed to have a little faith.”

Sang Mi wiped the tears from her face. “But how?”

“I’ve got no idea,” admitted Chris. “Last thing I remember is picking up that stone. Ask him,” he said, pointing to Charles. 

“Thank the shadow people. They seemed pretty eager to help once the stone had been buried. But they never do anything whilst others are watching,” Charles said with a wink.

Sang Mi couldn’t believe her eyes or ears. “I thought the shadow people were evil.”

“Perhaps they are,” said Charles. “But even the evil have a capacity to be good. We live in a universe of colour, not black and white.”

Chris chuckled. “Always the philosopher, Charles.” 

“I’ll add it to my many titles,” Charles laughed in reply. 

Sang Mi looked around. The sun was starting to rise, and to her relief, there wasn’t a shadow person to be seen. “Which way is the car?” she asked.

Chris and Charles scratched their heads in unison. “That might take some working out,” said Chris.

“When we do find your car,” said Charles. “Could I trouble you both for a ride?”

“Of course,” Chris beamed. “Where to?”

“Oh, nowhere far,” Charles replied. “The nearest phone will do. I’m not wholly happy leaving the stone here to be dug up by any old randomer. I’ll call my friends at the JDS and make sure they seal this place up as a quarantine zone.”

“That sounds like a deal.”
​
As the sun began to rise in the sky, the trio headed towards it, delighted to leave the shadow behind.

​America was vast, or at least it was supposed to be. It certainly didn’t feel like that when they’d been stuck in traffic for three hours.

“A lot of people are honking, will that help?” Sang Mi asked.

“It won’t help,” Chris replied. He thought about it for a moment, and then honked the horn a few times just in case he was wrong.

Sang Mi banged her head against the window. Continue your adventures with Cwej against all odds, she’d told herself, it’ll be everything you’d dreamed of, she’d told herself. She hadn’t anticipated that they’d move only a hundred and fifty feet over the course of an afternoon. They were stuck in their orange Honda Element, and she was becoming too familiar with it, and also too familiar with an audio stream the car picked up called NPR. She perked up. The car!

“Maybe we should name the car,” she said.

“The Vicinity III,” Chris said quickly.

“That sounds like you’re naming a boat.”

Chris mumbled that it was a really good name before conceding the point.

“What about Ol’Bessie? Like the cow that burned down Chicago?”

“There are about seven reasons I’m vetoing that,” he replied. “Number one, that’s too close to something else. Number two, O'Leary’s cow wasn’t named Bessie. Number three, that cow didn’t start the Chicago fire.” Chris stroked his chin. “Never mind, I guess I just have three reasons.”

She slumped. “It’s more fun if the cow started it.”

“The truth isn’t always fun.”

She banged her head against the window again. “I know that.” The line of cars suddenly started moving again, and she felt a brief rush as they moved a full hundred and twenty two meters before stopping again. But this time there was something to actually divert her.

“Exit! Food at the exit!”

He glanced at the sign. “Every exit has food. That’s how these roads work.”

“Yes, and I’m sure the good people of,” she squinted, “Elkhart, Indiana, will appreciate our patronage of… wherever!”

He sighed. “You just want to get out of this traffic jam.”

“I would sell one of my kidneys at this point.”

“Say no more,” he grumbled, but she could tell he was relieved at her suggestion too.

* * *

It took them half an hour to actually get to the exit—and as they got off they could see that some combination of a semi-truck turning over and construction on the road was making it a nightmare to get through. They weren’t the only people getting off, and Chris got frustrated at the slow driving from their fellow detour takers that he took his own detour. The roads and buildings had been interspersed with farms and fields for some time, but wherever they were thinned out even more.

“Sorry, I’m not actually getting us anywhere practical,” he said.

She smiled, and she meant it. “Nah, this is nice.” The world outside the window was different, and different was enough.

“Hey what’s that?” she said pointing at the plants she’d seen plenty of.

“Corn,” Chris answered.

“And that?”

“Soybeans.”

“And that?”

“More corn.”

Sang Mi squinted. There was something off about that tree—it looked weird. But she admitted she wasn’t familiar with most plants, let alone trees. Its trunk was stained, a dark reddish black.

“And that?”

“Grass.”

“No, the tree.”

He shrugged. “Missed it.”

They started cresting a hill, accelerating all the way, and Chris started to frown. He hit the brakes and, turning his head to look behind them, backed the car down again. Sang Mi watched the whole scene curiously, especially as he started up the hill once more. They climbed up at an even speed… and then she realized he wasn’t touching the acceleration pedal with his foot.

He gave her a look as her own face was clearly showing confusion. “That’s weird, right?”

“They didn’t invent gravity manipulation here early, did they? Like, that’s not for decades yet.”

“They sure haven’t.” He put his foot down on the accelerator.

They crested the hill, and the sun went out.

Chris put the headlights on, the bright ones, but they could only barely see the road ahead of them.

They were going faster. And faster.

On either side of the road there was something, a dark blur. It would appear there, then flutter by like telephone poles out of sight.

“Chris, slow down.”

“I can’t,” he said through gritted teeth.

“Slow down!”

“I CAN’T!”

The road was going by too fast; the blur had been going by at even intervals, and now as the world itself blurred it began to move like a butterfly: it was dancing, darker than darkness. Its eyes began to glow as the sole source of light in this bleak vision: they were green, but their light illuminated nothing. Sang Mi clutched the door of the car, as Chris struggled to control the wheel. The speedometer of the car had topped out, the needle shaking, trying to push onward.

“Can we… reverse?”

“We can’t—wait—there’s a switch by the gearshift, you have to pull out a little cover to hit it. I can’t let go of the wheel. Hold it down and you can shift it.”

The speed they were going made it hard to move, but she leaned over--there was a little cover, she tried to pull it off with her fingernails but it didn’t budge. She glanced around, and picked up a metal pen Cwej had been using—it was monogrammed. She slammed it into the cover. The tip of the pen smashed, but the cover remained. She tried again—and the little bit of plastic cracked in two. She ripped it off, and pushed the switch down with the broken pen, then pulled as hard as she could on the gearshift.
The car made a horrible screeching tearing noise—and then went in reverse.

Sort of.

Something was still pulling them forward, and the opposite forces made Sang Mi’s stomach churn, and the car start to first fish tail and then spin, and then they were off the road, and the car started spinning vertically instead of horizontally.

And the sun returned.

And the world returned.

And the car hit the ground.

* * *

Saki held the pill out to her. Sang Mi’s hand hung in the air trembling.

“Come on, we’ve done this countless times before. Stop wasting my time,” Saki said.

Sang Mi shook her head. “We’ve been taking the Delirium for a while now; what if I’m, like, getting addicted?”

Saki scoffed, loudly. “It’s not that kind of drug. It’s prescription.”

“A discontinued medicine neither of us have been prescribed!”

Saki only shrugged, and held the pill out closer to Sang Mi.

Her hand hesitated another moment before grabbing it, and downing it with a hefty slurp of water.

The two girls lay down. They’d done this before. You take the medicine, it puts you to sleep…

She drifted off.

And when her dreams started, the medicine kicked in.

Sang Mi found herself in a dark place, lit only by a faint purple-blue glow. Her feet were ankle deep in dark water. She held her hand out, and felt ahead of her. With the medicine, she could control the dream. She could do anything here. Well, nearly anything. She closed her eyes, and reached further until her hand touched something that wasn’t there.

And then it was.

“Doctor, she’s waking up.” There was the noise of footsteps, and Sang Mi opened her eyes to see bright lights.

“She shouldn’t be—was there something wrong with the anesthetics?”

She held her hand up to block the light—it was wrapped in a bandage. There was a mask over her face pumping air in, and she could feel something plugged into her arm—some sort of medieval version of an IV. She tried to sit up, but her head was spinning as soon as she moved, and she felt hands move to keep her down.

“You’re okay, just stay laying down—”

She reached for the mask and pulled it down—she could breathe just fine, well, mostly. “Where’s Chris?”

“You’re at Elkhart General Hospital.”

“Chris! Is Chris okay!?”

“The driver of the car is fine. Do you know what year it is?”

"2387. No, sorry, 2025, ignore the first thing.”

The nurse and the doctor glanced at each other.

“What’s your name?”

“Jhe Sang Mi—or Sarah Jhe depending on what piece of ID you’re looking at. One is my Gongen—er, Korean name, the other is my English one.”

“What’s the last thing you remember?”

“The car wouldn’t stop accelerating, the brakes wouldn’t work, and we sped off the road.”

“Right, we have a few more questions.”

They did not have a few more questions. They had many, and then she got a break to take a nap and eat, and then they had even more questions. She’d apparently broken a few ribs and gotten cut up from the window breaking when the car rolled over. But considering the speed they were going she’d ended up in pretty good shape. Apparently the 2007 Honda Element was a good choice on Chris’s part.

The most annoying part of their questioning wasn’t the part where the cop came in and tried to get her to say the driver had been inebriated, surprisingly, but the part where the doctor came in and said.

“Your blood tests came back and… we did them a second time just to be sure there was no mistake.”

She sipped her juice box. “And?”

“You have fatal levels of petrochlorides in your bloodstream. Actually, not just fatal, your blood might be a biohazard.”

Sang Mi laughed. “Oh, yeah, rookie Earther mistake. I’m fine, those things are just littered in the soil where I’m from. If I couldn’t survive with those in my body nobody would be alive there.”

The doctor nodded very slowly. “…I was unfamiliar with that. Still, your blood could be lethal to… Americans?” She said, clearly hoping she was getting the vibe right. “So please be careful with any open cuts.”

She brushed it off. “Yeah yeah, no worries. How are my ribs?”

“Doing well. We should be able to discharge you soon. We weren’t allowed to let your uncle see you due to the police trying to detain him, but it looks like that’s sorted so he’ll be in to see you soon.”

That proved to be true, and a belabored Chris came in, clearly relieved to see she was doing well.

“How are you doing, kid?”

“Don’t call me kid, and pretty good aside from these primitive needles they’re using. Hey, did you hear my blood is a biohazard? That’s pretty cool, right?”

His face twitched. “…I would not use those words no. I’ve been on the phone with a lot of folks: the JDS, Geneva, SIGNET… I even deigned to call Blue Candle.”

“Oof, thank you for your service.”

He nodded. “Anyway, I think I’ve sorted it all out. We should be able to get your hospital records here sealed, the car is getting fixed, the cops ruled the crash an accident… all that’s left is dealing with the problem.”

She straightened up as much as one could in a hospital bed. “The thing that knocked us off the road.”

He nodded. “We can’t let it do that to any more people.”

“So, what’s the plan?”

“The plan is, I get a hotel room for you, and you wait there till I deal with this.”

That wasn’t what she wanted to hear. “Really? I have a right to go with you on this!”

He shook his head. “You got hurt. Under my watch.”

“I’m fine! Once they let me out of here we can fix my ribs up no problem.”

He rubbed his hands together. “I didn’t think we were in danger on the road my—”

“I didn’t either! Who could have guessed that?”

“I should have."

“Bullshit. Bullshit and you know it. Stop blaming yourself.”

“But—”

“Ah—no buts! You couldn’t have known, I couldn’t have known. Let’s get out of here, figure out how to beat this thingy, and pick our car up.”

He smiled. “Yeah. Sounds like a plan. Stop making me look like the kid here though.”

She stuck her tongue out.

“Mission accomplished,” he laughed.

* * *

They made their way downtown, and slipped into a restaurant next to an outdoor ice-rink, one that naturally didn’t have any ice on it since it was April. After their waitress took their order, Sang Mi slid (a polite word for lightly threw) her phone across the table to Chris, who picked it up and read.

“The Cable Line Road Monster?”

“It’s a very creative name,” she sighed. “And mind you, most sources call it the Cable Line Monster.”

“Most sources?”

“Okay, like, nearly all of them, but ‘Cable Line Road Monster’ sounds cooler, so I'm saying that.” Chris nodded, bemused. "But yeah, it’s a local urban legend. Though it doesn’t seem like there is a consistent version of the story.” Sang Mi adopted her spookiest demeanor. It wasn’t that spooky. “Sometimes it starts with a guy on a motorbike–sometimes the guy and his girlfriend are in a car. Sometimes it’s a dad and his son in the car. And more. So let’s just choose one—a man and his girlfriend are zooming down the road on a motorcycle—only it doesn’t hover, it just has wheels because they haven’t invented the GravDrive yet.”

Chris smiled politely.

“He’s driving fast, she’s clutched to him, holding on tight. And then they see it there in front of them—the green-eyed creature. Maybe it’s furry. Maybe it’s a shadow. But it’s there, sudden and swift and there’s not enough time to think as the man reacts—he veers off the road! The wheels churn up grass as the motorcycle accelerates even faster—and then there is a tree. He hits it, head on, splattered in a human-shaped mark of blood and shadow that sinks in. And the mark stays there on that tree.”

“What about the girl?”

“Oh, sometimes she isn’t there,” she noted as the waitress handed them plates of food.
“She was there when you told it,” Chris noted.

“Oh right.” She raised her hands back up and resumed the spooky voice. “The girl survived, horrifically mangled, and in the hospital she described the creature, how it watched her lying there on the ground. Just staring.” She paused. “Actually, it makes sense she was there to tell the story, cause how else would we know what happened?”

Chris folded his arms and laughed. “Some ghost story.” He sat on his reaction a moment. “No… that’s not fair. It’s clearly real. You nearly died.”

She flapped her hand at him. “I’m fine! Barely injured!”

He didn’t argue the point, but his concern was evident. “Wait a second, there was no tree?”

“And then there was,” Sang Mi noted. “They cut the tree down in 1994.” She pulled a picture of the tree up on her phone. “So if the tree is gone, how is there even still a legend?”

Chris looked at the dark stain on the tree, and took a bite of his burger. “That is the question to answer, isn’t it?”
 
 
* * *

It was after dark when the pair of travelers returned to Cable Line Road. This time, they pulled over and stepped out to look at the drying grass where the tree had once been. Sang Mi raised her phone, and lined up the photograph of the tree on her screen with the place it would have been as best she could. Lowering it, to reveal the empty space, she felt like the darkness was thicker there. There was no truth to that objectively, it was the same color of night as the rest of the world. But still, there it felt. A hollow and invisible pulse drawing her in from the shadows.

“How do we deal with something that isn’t there?” she asked. She felt like she should have asked earlier.

“Easy,” Chris said. “We go where it is.”

She tried to gauge his face in the shadows. “Where do things go that don’t exist?”

He walked forward, gesturing for her to follow. They stopped in front of where the tree was, and Chris took her hand, and raised it up with his own. “Close your eyes. We’re going to reach out and touch the tree. Where the tree is.”

“…You mean like in a dream?”

“Sorry?”

“Saki and I, when we were experimenting with Delirium… when you got control of the dream, you could find things that weren’t there. Find them in the dream. You weren’t really creating them, just…”

He nodded. “Just like that. That’s good, this has a better chance of working. Now close your eyes like I asked.”

“Right, sorry.”

She did, and their hands reached out together. She thought about the tree, the tree that was definitely there. Like it was there in the dream, an image waiting to be carved out of stone just waiting within the block of marble. Their hands pressed forward.

And touched bark, scratchy and rough.

They opened their eyes, and there it was. A tree, stained dark with a shadow like a person. The world around the tree was strange, it seemed to be half remembered—like a dream. Turning her gaze, the details of the world didn’t stay consistent. Stones along the road moved, or vanished, between the movements of her eyes.

The tree seemed to stretch higher into the sky, its branches twisting and segmenting, covering the stars in a spider-web curtain.

Chris too rose to a new height. “You don’t scare me.”

The wind blew, and the grass, corn, and branches rattled with laughter. “I nearly drank that girl’s blood,” said the wind.

Sang Mi tensed, but Chris put a hand on her shoulder. “I’ve faced things far worse than a roadside monster. You survive feasting on death and pain. On whispers in schoolyards.”

“I survived being cast into a darkness beyond darkness. And someday my master,” there was a coarse chattering noise like teeth gnashing and grinding, “Will return for me.”

Chris furrowed his brow.

“Do you know what this is?”

“Maybe,” he answered quickly. “It’s from a time before time. When there was less of a barrier between things like dreams and the tactile. Which doesn’t make it as special as it thinks.”

The world laughed again.

“You’re just a bad dream,” Chris shouted. But Sang Mi could see he was becoming less confident.

She looked at the stain. It seemed to radiate death. She reached her hand out, her fingers curled with hesitation. “It’s a bad dream…” She squinted, and then looked back at Cwej. “Wait, normally dreams aren’t real.”

“Well, yes, but I think we’re in sort of—”

“I know what it’s like to confuse dreams for reality. Too well.” As her hands reached into the shadow, she could touch it like wet silk. “And I know what it’s like to lose someone I love. And Chris does too. More than me, probably,” she clenched her hands around the darkness. “And I know something else. I know that Mrs. O’malley’s cow didn’t start the Chicago Fire. You’re just a story.”

The voice spoke up with anger. “You nearly died! Your bones cracked and your blood should have spelled into the soil—”

“Shoulda-coulda-woulda,” Chris cut in. “I’m sure someone died here, at some point.” He reached his hands over Sang Mi’s shoulders to grasp the darkness as well. Four hands now gripped the stain tightly. “But not every version of your story could happen. Which means your power is in the telling. So we’re going to dream bigger than you.”

“Which isn’t too hard,” Sang Mi noted.

They pulled at the stain, and it started to rip off the tree with a sticky ripping sound. The branches of the tree tried to curl around them, but with a heave, they gave one final yank, and dropped to the ground, Sang Mi landing on Chris’s chest. She pushed herself up, making Chris wince, and there was the bloody stain.

A two-dimensional cut-out of blood and shadow stumbling through the grass on its stubby feet.

Chris raised his eyes and hand to the sky, and mumbled, “Sun and rain.”

The stain didn’t have eyes, but it seemed to watch them as the night broke into day. The sky cracked for rain, washing away the shadows and the blood into wisps.

The dream vanished, and they stood together again in a treeless world by the roadside.

Sang Mi looked around, everything seemed normal. “Is it gone?”

Chris nodded with a smile, then shrugged. “Probably. I think so, its hard to tell. But it won’t be back for a long time certainly. This road will be a lot safer.”

She nodded, and looked down the concrete stretching to the horizon. “I guess we’d better get back on it.”

* * *

Chris handed the cashier a twenty—he was running lower on cash than he expected. He’d have to make sure to get more before the next snack run. Oh well, he was sure he wouldn’t forget.

“Hey Chris, look!” Sang Mi had been looking at the rest stop’s limited book selection, most of which was local tourism pamphlets. But she’d found a hardback book called Roadside Oddities of America. “This has information on all sorts of critters. Like look,” she opened it up. “Mothman! He’s a man, and a moth! And…” She turned to a different page. “The Beast of Busco, a big turtle!” 

Chris thought about it, and gestured for her to bring it over. “Alright, you got it. Might as well see the sights on our way there.” He added it to their purchase, and they got back in the Honda Element. Sang Mi excitedly flipped through the pages of the used book. 

“Oh yeah, I thought of a name for the car!” she said.

He turned it on. “Oh yeah? Better than The Vicinity III?”

“Way better.” She gestured with both hands. “The Odyssey!”

Chris pursed his lips.

“What? What!? It’s a cool name!”

“There’s already a car called the Honda Odyssey.”

She pouted. “Well this is ours.”

He laughed. Sure, why not. “Fair enough. Chris Cwej and Jhe Sang Mi, on the inaugural voyage of the Odyssey.” He put the car into drive, and as they got back on the road it hit him. “Uh, Sang Mi? Didn’t the Odyssey take… a long time, with a lot of hardship?”

“It’s just a name,” she replied.

He nodded. But he couldn’t help but think her words had stained the world just like that tree.

Eh, it was just a feeling.
​
It’ll be fine.

Welcome to the Book of the Fair, and the beginning of our new journey with Cwej and Sang Mi!