by Dan Henk
By this point I had passed a few more small roads. The woods were relaxing and expanding as I approached the lake flanking the Virginia border. The sides of the trail sunk into steep sidewalls of packed dirt, the passage grew rockier, and large mossy stones fought for territory with scraggly bushes, all buried under the shade of overhanging branches. The sounds of civilization had languished, the forest deepening into a sepulchral ken.
Another half-hour, and the route hit a thin grove of trees before abruptly turning to the right. Directly ahead, right through the thin line of timber, was a small escarpment. Stepping from the sandy path, I walked across the gray, shadowed peat and up to the edge of the bluff. The short cliff dropped a few feet, a small swath of sand below stretching out to the lake. Who needs to swim when you don’t have to breathe? I backed up, broke into a sprint, and sailed through the air. Pummeling the water with a huge splash, I felt foolish when I came to a jarring halt, my crouched legs sinking barely up to mid thigh before an impact with the lakebed ended my grandstanding. The water swirled and eddied in an aggravated state of confusion around my torso. I pulled my feet from the muck and started walking. The water ascended in gentle waves as I trolled forward until it covered my head. The light started to taper off, the thick bluish-green slowly suppressing the luminosity until I was smothered in dark, shifting currents. I could make out almost nothing, and it only grew more impenetrable as I descended. My feet kept bumping into obstacles, the water impeding every move. I could step over almost anything that was in front of me, but a couple of times my feet wouldn’t rise high enough to surmount the wall of black that blocked my path. I’d feel around with my hands, discerning some submerged impediment, move sideways until I got around it, and stagger forward. I sensed I was headed in the right direction, but a nagging anxiety insinuated that for all I knew I could be following the lake lengthwise.
The ground started to slope upwards, followed shortly by a tint of color filtering into the sable miasma. The water was growing lighter. My head broke the surface, and a glance over my shoulder confirmed I was on the opposite side. Looking across the expanse, I could see long, shimmering plateaus of gently heaving waves, but no boats. A line of trees, the distance reducing them to a scraggly parade of olive shards, rolled up and down the uneven bank skirting the opposite side. I kept moving, rising out of the water and plodding up the small stretch of beach into the waiting woods. It wasn’t far now. I started jogging again, darting through the underbrush. The pines here were fewer, the trees flaunting more flamboyant autumnal colors. The ground was a bed of fallen leaves, mostly decayed into moribund browns, the rigor mortis making them brittle beneath my footfalls. Reds and yellows rustled together in a loose canopy, the last hard-fought vestiges of fall, thinning and tumbling almost as I passed. Soon enough. Everything dies eventually.
I was almost to the car. The clearing was just ahead. Tall brown wild grass bordered a pitted circle of asphalt. The Mustang slouched at the far corner, obscured by the shadow of overhanging branches and half-buried under a pile of fallen leaves and cones. The muscle car’s faded blue paint was cracking, further marred by rust spots near the wheel wells. It looked as if it had been abandoned years ago, the rotting carcass blending into the slowly decomposing backdrop. As long as it still fired up, that was all that mattered. I strolled up to it, the windswept sand of the lot crunching beneath my feet. The afternoon sun was blazing, sheathing the entire area in an almost palpable torrent of heat and light. I stepped into the shade of the car and brushed the leaves off the windshield, noticing the passenger side window was broken in. I opened the driver door, which shouldn’t have been unlocked, reached under the dash, and popped the trunk, already knowing what I’d find. All the camping gear and tools were gone. Slamming the trunk, I traipsed back and pulled the driver’s seat forward. Digging into the worn carpeting, I lifted the fake plastic floorboard. The stash of money, multi-tool, knife, and gun was still there. So were the keys. They were necessary to open the hood, thanks to a lock I had welded into place, so I assumed nothing had been stolen from the engine. I knelt down, felt underneath the car with my hand, and extracted the key I would have needed had the window not been broken. Walking around front, I unlocked the hood and reconnected the battery. Climbing into the driver’s seat, I pulled the choke lever. A flick of the keys in the switch, a pump of gas at the pedal, and it roared to life. It was then I noticed the gaping hole in the dash where my CD player had been. Nice. Digging under the passenger seat, I could feel the clothes I’d stashed. At least they didn’t steal those. I climbed out, dragged the clothes into the driver’s seat, and slipped into the jeans and black T-shirt. Tying my sneakers and doffing a trucker’s cap, I ducked back in and slammed the door. The clothes felt strange and out of place on my skin. I could sense their roughness, the constricting fabric feeling stiff and antiquated. A necessary evil. I spun the wheel and slowly circled as I drove out of the lot. Crunching over a row of weeds, I crossed from worn asphalt to a badly paved road. It looked long abandoned, cracked and pitted by years of neglect, the bleached tar wandering off toward the highway in a twisting route of weed-obscured bends.
I doubt anyone had roadblocks this far up. The authorities had no way of knowing who I was, where I was going, or even that I had a vehicle. That is, unless they managed to ascertain some identity from my headless corpse. I do have a few tattoos that could act as markers, not to mention my fingerprints, but how could they know I was in the alien body? Most likely my former shell was just an unfortunate victim. I was headed to upstate NY, to a cabin in the boonies I had purchased under a bogus name. I had more money and supplies stashed there, which should give me a little time to plan. The only tricky part would be buying gas. I originally had fuel containers stashed in the back, but those had been stolen, so I would need to make a few stops. That’ll be fun. This vehicle was fast, but it got horrible gas mileage. I didn’t think they could trace the cabin back to me. I purchased the property with cash using a false name, but nothing is certain and the government is only getting more paranoid. If everything went as planned, I was hoping to stay there for a week or so. I probably wouldn’t need longer than that.
CHAPTER VI
AND NOW THE HARD PART
I hadn’t made extensive plans beyond getting this body. I didn’t even know if my plan would work. Now that I’d gotten this far, I had a rough idea of what I wanted to do next; I just had to figure out exactly how to accomplish it. In this increasingly organized and high tech world, it would be difficult to elude detection for very long. I needed to go somewhere relatively uninhabited, like the jungles of South America. I also needed to figure out a way to acquire income and materials. Buying a Jeep, a Mustang, a cabin, a daily driver, and various other expenses had left me broke. But all this was minor. I had the body now, I just had to plan a future course of action.
I was going to avoid the interstate highways, relying on back roads as much as possible, and although it would reduce my chances of being detected, it also would make everything, including gas stations, scarcer. The little side road I was on T-boned into a paved two-lane street heading north. I had hours of rustic scenery ahead of me.
The sun slowly crossed the sky as I made my way. The road alternated between thick patches of softly yellowing sunlight and a cooler kaleidoscope of thin rays passing through the gaps among overhanging leaves. My gas gauge continually slid in a long, slow arc toward empty. The endless walls of trees, ablaze with the bright colors of early autumn, were occasionally broken up by neatly tended fields harboring a distant farmhouse. It was all very bucolic, a much slower pace of life than I was used to. I wondered what it was like, spending your whole life in one place, tending the same fields season after season until the day you died. Feeding the basic human instincts of eating, sleeping, and reproducing, and little else. Then again, it might have been pretentious to really think there was anything else more worthwhile.
I would come to a halt at the occasional red light, passing through
a small town consisting of crumbling strip malls and old antique stores. Everything seemed a bit more deserted than usual, the stores empty, the few passing cars intent on reaching their destinations. Perhaps they moved a bit faster and more purposefully than normal, although that could have been my imagination. I was keyed up and hypertensive. Things had changed so quickly in the past few days, and I felt the need to constantly push myself with a rush of motion and goals that kept me from focusing on how much I might have really lost.
I doubted anyone could see much through my tinted windows, but I was keenly aware of the fact that I would stand out like a sore thumb to anyone who did. A little dose of paranoia kept me constantly on edge whenever a car passed. The lustrous colors and endless parade of falling leaves seemed to portend an end to something. Then again, I thought the same thing every fall. Moods seemed to flow with the seasons. And weren’t moods chemically based? So they should have simply been dying vestiges of my human body. Or maybe that was partially mental as well? Perhaps a bit of both. I kept driving.
At first this form had seemed alien, like something I controlled from within, but a slow change had crept over me while my attention was focused on escape. I couldn’t explain it, but this frame felt like me now, as if it was all I had ever known. My instincts and emotions seemed heightened, as if boosted by some neural stimulant, yet they remained uncomplicated and tranquil at the same time. Maybe this body was adjusting to me? Trying to match my native environment? For the moment I was overanalyzing this. I could work on it once I was in the clear. My gas was low and I needed a change of pace. I pulled over at a small station. It looked like a mom and pop joint, the peeling tan paint revealing the white bricks beneath. Pumps that looked like refugees from the ’60s, bubbly and weathered, with exposed blotches of metal emerging through a brittle ocher enamel. A rust-stained oval sign, the red lettering cracking with age, marked the plot as “Tom’s Gas.” A fatigued brown pickup, a good three decades old, stood in the packed yellow dirt that served as a parking lot. The ripped screen door flew open and a man in his fifties burst out. Faded overalls surmounted a white T-shirt, a worn mesh hat advertising “Milemarker” curbing his greasy salt and pepper mane. White strands of hair jutted haphazardly from his neck, lavishly contrasting with the sun-burnt leather of his skin. He looked distracted. Paying no attention to my Mustang, he locked the door in a flurry of jiggling keys and ran straight to his pickup. Scrambling in, he slammed the door and tore out of the lot, barely missing my car as he headed up the road. Twin clouds of dust flew up in his wake, billowing past in hazy rolls of yellow smoke. As they melted away, the old man and his beater were long gone. Strange. I got out and tried the pump. Nothing. I wasn’t sure how to turn the pump back on, and I didn’t want to break in and risk attracting attention. Crawling back in the Mustang, I spun out of the lot.
I was riding on fumes when I spotted another station, a small, decrepit store built of rotted wood and faded red paint. I pulled into the gravel lot, next to the single ancient pump, and opened the door. Stepping out, my boots crunched loudly on the sun-bleached rocks.
No one came out to greet me. I walked up to the grime-encrusted office window and peered inside. It looked deserted. The shadows harbored a small, beaten wood desk. A rusty fan sat atop it amidst a blanket of papers strewn about haphazardly. The rolling stool was pushed back, its rusty wheels askance, as if someone had exited in a hurry. Beyond it were notes, photos, and newspaper clippings pinned to a pockmarked bulletin board. The edges of the trapped papers rose and fell slowly in the breeze. The garage gate was open, and rusty tools littered the floor, battling the oil stains and crumpled towels for space. An old, battered red pickup, probably a late ’60s model, was parked alongside, the butt end sticking out beyond the garage wall. I wandered back over to the pump and lifted the worn metal handle. Pointing the nozzle at the gravel, I pulled the trigger. Gas gushed out. A stroke of luck! Unlocking the gas cap, I filled the tank. Finishing up with a tap of the lever, I headed back toward the building. I tried the office door, but to no avail. The dented brass knob moved loosely in its socket, refusing to twist fully. I could probably get in through the garage door, but why bother. I had what I needed. The only thing pushing me to explore was curiosity, and I didn’t really have the time.
Heading back to the car, I ducked in and spun out onto the road.
More of the same panorama overtook me as I rolled down the rustic byways. Trees bordered the road in columns, breaking open at intervals into wide expanses of grassland harboring cattle or horses. A rustic wooden farmhouse often rested in the distance, its metal silo glinting in the afternoon sun. Tall weeds and grass mingled in a labyrinth of intertwined blades, their advancing swarm eating away at the worn asphalt. Sand littered the road, at times swelling into little drifts and lakes. Every indication pointed to a serene, bucolic region; meanwhile a profound uneasiness tugged at the corners. Maybe it was just my overactive imagination, but things seemed too quiet. Too few cars on the road, and there was something very strange about the gas stations.
I was now in rural Maryland, headed toward Pennsylvania, and gas was running low again. The road was more open here, bordered by wide fields of tall foliage, the tops wavering like a body of water as they rippled in the wind. A white brick shack of a gas station cropped up on the right, and I pulled in. This one looked populated and at least marginally modern, with three pumps, a paved lot, and a small office that was built, or at least refurbished, in the last twenty years. The building was a featureless rectangle, sporting a flat roof and large bay windows. At least it wasn’t another ramshackle house serving double duty. Neon signs glittered in the window, making it look almost up to date. No one came out to greet me, but lights were on inside the building. All the more visible now that the sun had passed its zenith and the shadows of dusk were slowly creeping in.
I climbed out of the Mustang, slammed the door, and slowly circled around to the pump. Not new enough to be digital, but at least it didn’t look like it belonged in a museum. I pulled the nozzle, unlocked the gas cap, and filled the tank. I didn’t glance around, keeping my back to the front door, listening closely for footsteps. Nothing. When the tank was full I slowly turned around, carefully scanning the building as I replaced the nozzle. Beyond the pump, a tall countertop, half- obscured by a cigarette poster, concealed most of the clerk. There was little chance he could see me clearly through the glass. Time for the moment of truth. I strolled toward the building. Opening the glass door, I stepped into a small mini-market, its single row of shelves lined with packages of pork rinds and snacks. Behind the counter sat an old man, half-obscured by containers of beef jerky and an ancient manual cash register. Racks of cigarettes lined the walls behind him. The brow of his cap hid his eyes, but it was clear they were directed at the paper he held out in front of him. His hat and shirt both advertised Remington, the redneck picture completed by his scrubby face and shoulder-length greasy hair. He cocked his head up toward me, and the weed he was chewing fell out of his mouth, bouncing off the stained white T-shirt barely covering his gut. His eyes looked ready to pop out and he half-rose, stumbling back a few steps and knocking the chair over. I slowly walked up to the counter, and he continued stumbling backwards.
Stopping in my tracks, I pulled a pen and notepad out of my pocket and scrawled on it “MILITARY-TOP SECRET-DON’T TELL ANYONE.” I flipped the paper around so he could read it. He glanced at the paper, glanced at me, glanced at the paper again, and rang me up, his hands visibly shaking as he punched the keys. “Thirty bucks.” I pulled out some cash and held it out to him. He just looked at it. I dropped two twenties on the counter and took a step back. He scooped it up. Fumbling with the bills in the register, he slapped a ten-dollar bill on the counter and backed away. I pocketed the ten spot and walked out.
One obstacle down. Hopefully this hick won’t tell anyone, at least not for a while. Even then he’ll have a hard time getting anyone who matters to listen to him. The government has no idea wher
e I went, or even my mode of transportation, and this is a big country.
I didn’t want to try this too many more times and risk pressing my luck. A couple more stops like this and the military, by questioning the right people, could piece together a route and track me. I climbed back in the Mustang and spun out onto the main road.
The sky was now darkening, the isolated roads abandoned tunnels of sandy asphalt winding through a desolate forest. The groves of trees occasionally fell away to reveal dark stretches of land illuminated by a moonlit sky, the savanna dotted by the meager light of a distant abode. The grassland quivered with the wind, rolling in undulating waves. It had been several hours, and I was now in rural Pennsylvania. The gas gauge had fallen steadily toward empty again. I would have to stop again soon.
